


Solitaire

by bloodgutsandstarbucks



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Adult Peter Parker, Alcohol, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Anal Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Self-Discovery, Stripper Tony Stark, not the focus of this story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:40:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22171939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodgutsandstarbucks/pseuds/bloodgutsandstarbucks
Summary: After a traumatic experience, Tony loses his marriage and his business empire in one fell swoop. At rock bottom, it takes real change to pick up the pieces, to dig himself out of the funk he's been living in.It's not pretty.Along the path of healing Tony meets a bright young man, Peter Parker, who makes the entire journey worth it.
Relationships: Peter Parker/Tony Stark
Comments: 27
Kudos: 164





	Solitaire

**Author's Note:**

> This is by far the most self indulgent thing I have ever, ever written. This isn't for everyone - I wrote it entirely for myself as a therapeutic tool without worrying about style or accuracy. It was finished some few months ago but it sat stale while I contemplated whether I decided to share it, and now it's time to let it go.

\-----

“You’re a fucking mess.”

Blinking at the intrusion, Tony lifts his head from sofa armrest and at his living room doorway. Licking the staleness off his lips, he eyes where his best friend leans against the open door frame, arms crossed over his chest and doing his best impression of a disappointed parent. 

Rhodey shakes his head at him, eyes quickly averting to the ground and muttering something under his breath. It sounds distinctly something like disdain. Which is entirely uncalled for, Tony thinks. Still half asleep, Tony huffs in an attempt to echo the unmistakable disapproval exuding from his friend, looking down at his own body, blinking at what he finds. Beer has spilled down his front and onto the couch he’s half-asleep on. 

Maybe it’s that. 

Or maybe it’s the banana hammock he’s still wearing from last night's job.

The line of Rhodey’s mouth is flat and, whilst the other man doesn’t exactly express the words _profoundly unimpressed_ , verbatim from his mouth, Tony considers himself a smart guy and takes the liberty of reading between the lines.

With a pained groan Tony heaves himself into a sitting position, setting his near empty beer bottle on the treated coffee table, just left to the coaster. The stretch, like a newborn foal discovering their limbs, feels impossibly good when he raises his arms above his head.

“I’ll have you know that I am a regular amount of mess,” Tony yawns as he stands, swiping the cigarette carton from the table as he ambles forward, kicking aside the empty pizza boxes that litter the floor, landing with a soft thud as the cardboard hits the linoleum. 

Flicking the carton open with a snap of his wrists he offers a cigarette to his friend who respectfully declines. Shifting from his perch he follows Tony’s tired trudge to the dining table, diverting to the fridge at the nearby kitchen to get a soda before settling opposite Tony. The end of the cigarette burns bright orange when Tony fishes the lighter from the back pocket of his jeans, taking a long drag as his friend helps cracks open the can of room temperature soda. 

“Well, to what do I owe the pleasure, honeybear?” he asks, flicking ashes into his makeshift ashtray.

The chair creaks when his friend slumps upon it, scraping across the weathered floorboards as he shifts back. Rhodeys’ head tilts to the side as he considers Tony in that quiet, assessing way he does, the way that makes Tony feel like cellophane. 

“Pleasure’s all yours,” the other man mutters, sipping at his soda. “You didn’t come to another meeting, Tony.”

The groan that escapes his mouth is unabashedly one of impolite disinterest.

Nope, nope - no. Disdain for the topic of conversation has him slouching and propping his socked feet up on the table, exhaling towards his browning ceiling. The slightly repulsed look from his friend doesn’t fail to escape his attention, but he refuses to be bothered by it. It’s his table. Besides, his feet are hardly the worst thing it’s seen.

“That? That’s what you came all the way out here for?” Tony shakes his head, pointing his half burnt cigarette at the other man. “Waste of a trip, old friend.”

“Oh no, I’m here for the hospitality,” Rhodey drawls, gesturing to Tony’s yellowing socks and the empty take-out cartons that crowd the kitchen bench. “C’mon, man. I haven’t seen you for weeks. You’re not trying to make me worry about you now, are ya? I have a heart condition.”

“Pfft,” Tony mutters, taking another drag until the paper burns dangerously close to his fingers, enjoying the split-second scorch before stubbing the remainder into his ashtray. 

Ashtray is fancy nomenclature for what used to be a fruit bowl. It’s crystal, bought from an auction of some old Hollywood movie producer that he didn’t care to learn the name for. To be fair to himself, Tony doesn’t really have a penchant for any fruit that doesn’t come out of tin or plastic. So now the fruit bearing crystal makes makes itself useful as a cigarette-butt graveyard.

It’s like, poetic, or something, right?

“You know I don’t like those things,” Tony says finally, leaning back in his chair. “Standing up there and getting in touch with all my ooey-gooey feelings? Sitting around in a circle singing Kumbaya? C’mon, you know that’s not for me.”

“It was helping,” Rhodey counters. “It’s good for you.”

“Which by virtue means that I should avoid it,” Tony nods, kicking his friends foot under the table. The return scowl from his friend is uncalled for, however not unexpected.

“So, see you there next week?”

“Sure,” Tony snorts, ”I’ll mark it down on my calendar. Yep, booked in, right next to my meeting with the Queen of England.”

“Give her my best,” Rhodey says, saluting him with a raise of the soda can, sides crinkling inwards

An easy silence falls between them, after. That’s the beauty of an old and sustained friendship, Tony thinks, quietly grateful - no matter how fraught the conversation, the silence is always companionable. 

“How’s Pep,” Tony asks for a change of subject, helping himself to another cigarette, frowning when he realises he only has two left. He could have sworn he had a full packet this morning. “You want something to eat? I think there’s something in the fridge that’s edible, well, probably edible.”

“Probably edible?”

“For an unexpected house guest. You like mustard, right?”

His friend cringes, holding up a hand in supplication. “Nah man, I’m good. Can’t say I’m interested in leaving here with salmonella, but thank you.”

“ _Salmonella_ \--”

Rhodey clears his throat, looking pointedly at Tony's castle of ever-accumulating trash. “Pep’s good.”

“Yeah?” He asks, surveying the way Rhodey’s eyes light up at the former, the corner of his lips going soft in affectionate surrender. He remembers feeling like that, once, when there was someone to feel soft for. It’s a thought worthy of a frown.

“Yeah, man. Things are good, you know. Really good.”

“And is --”

“Work’s good too. Yeah, I know your dumb ass is gonna ask. Meetings are good, if you ever bothered to attend one. Y’know, like you’ve been _mandated_ to.”

“Have you seen, uh --”, he clears his throat, steeling his resolve and trying again. “Have you spoken with --”

“Pep still works with her,” the man confirms gently, rubbing his mouth as if saying even that is too much. “She invites her to brunch together every now and then.” 

Tony nods, mumbling with the filter still caught between his lips. “Is she --”

“Tony,” Rhodey says quietly. “C’mon, man. You’ve moved on, remember?”

He says this, gesturing to the room at large, the house Tony lives in alone, filled with items from another lifetime, documents and garbage piles over surfaces, domestic debris. He refers to the lifeless ornaments and knick-knacks of a helpless bachelor on his shelves, the books he’d read in college, retrieved from dusty basement boxes. Tony remembers very well how he is moving on. Onwards and upwards. 

Tony hums thoughtfully, standing to place the empty soda can in the kitchens overflowing trash can, delicately balancing it upon the precarious tower of canned soup tins. He should really do something about that, honestly, he might as well get a new bag out for the take-out he’s no doubt going to be ordering tonight. 

He’s got a craving for Indian. Lots of oil and garlic, it’s almost Italian, if you squint and tilt your head. His grandfather would be proud. Probably.

“I have _moved_ on, as you have so very generously brought up,” Tony concedes, snagging another beer from the fridge, snapping the cap on the counter top and sculling a mouthful. “Got my own place, my own business - which is booming, thank you for asking.”

The stare Rhodey fixes upon him is as deadened as the browning basil plant on his kitchen windowsill.

“Yeah, you can just go ahead and turn that frown upside down, honey bear. I have moved on, exhibit A,” Tony insists, spreading his arms wide and pointing to all of the spaces that are just his. The garbage and the fridge.

“Tony.”

He caves, slumping on the chair besides the other man, clasping his hands together in what he hopes looks like a beseeching manner. “Come on, buddy,” Tony whines, widening his eyes. “Tell me she’s doing awful. Please, I gotta know. You _know_ I gotta know.”

“Tony.”

“If she’s miserable, don’t hold back, please. I want all the gory details.”

Just because he’s moved on doesn’t mean he’s not allowed to be _spiteful_.

“This is where I tell you to get a life,” Rhodey pushes his face away. “A hobby. Remember those?”

“A hobby,” Tony repeats. “You want me to take up golfing when I have all this?” Tony gestures grandly to his humble abode, lighting another cigarette and pointing it towards the original portrait that he mustachioed with a sharpie. “Hmm, you want me to learn how to knit or something?”

“You would look fetching in crochet,” the other man concedes. 

“I would look great in anything, thanks.”

His friend winces. “Thong notwithstanding. Come on man, could you put on some clothes?”

Tony peers down unashamedly at his near nakedness and brushes some stray ashes off his thigh, frowning when they disintegrate in his leg hair. “Didn’t realise my body offended you, purity police. You’ve seen me in far less - or have you already forgotten college?”

“Still trying to forget,” Rhodey still radiating disdain, his face doing something like the equivalent of swallowing a lemon. “I take it you still a creature of the night these days?”

“Amongst many things,” Tony grins wryly, leaning forward across the kitchen counter. “Don’t give me that face - I know that face. Don’t do that. I’ve just been busy, y’know, I work two jobs on nicotine and spite alone. It’s a hard knock life.”

Checking his watch, a regretful grimace is aimed towards Tony that makes his heart sink a little. “I gotta head out, little Annie,” he says, rising to his feet. “I just wanted to check in to make sure you’re not choking on your own vomit.”

“Not since college,” Tony lies, shaking his hand and pulling him in for a half hug, patting his friend heartily on the back. 

“Uh-huh.”

“Thanks for coming by for the pep talk. Maybe give some warning next time so I can perforate my eardrums beforehand.”

“Yeah, no. Promise me you’ll get out of the house for something other than work,” Rhodey requests, pulling away with a clap to Tony’s shoulder and a stern expression. It vividly reminds Tony of their college days, except it was Tony prompting his friend to leave his dorm to have some fun. How times change, he thinks.

“Promise,” Tony says. “I’ll see you at the meeting next week.”

The look his friend gives him as he walks out the front door is a heart-jarring amalgamation of false hope and deservingly dubious. Tony can hardly blame him. He watches a little forlornly as his friend climbs into his beat-up Toyota pick-up and pulls off the curb, waving out the open window in time with his a toot of the horn. 

Closing the door behind him, he presses his naked back against the flaking timber and looks, really looks. With Rhodey's words echoing in his skull, Tony can’t help but look around and assess his life a little. It’s an unfortunate talent that Rhodey has, his judgemental gaze so piercing it’s inevitable that his disparagement would seep through the cracks.

Wincing at the acrid smell of leftovers and his own sweat, Tony nearly trips on a box on the ground. Maybe his friend has a point.

Not that Tony will ever tell him that.

\-----

It’s not accurate to say he’s a complete mess, Tony thinks days later. 

Yeah, he’s a bit all over the place. A mismatched hodgepodge of a guy, sure. A partial mess, definitely. At least seventy-five percent of a complete mess, which mathematically speaking would just make him a hot mess, if he was being generous. 

What he means to say is this: compared to his prime years, Tony is a shitshow, of course, no contest. 

But relatively speaking, he’s doing okay. If his face is no longer pressed into the mud, that’s got to be enough.

\-----

Tony had married the great love of his life at twenty young years of age. 

It was the norm back then. Marry young and start your life early, have two-and-a-half kids, buy a house in the suburbs -- all that whole cookie-cutter package that they sold in glossy prime-time sitcoms and feel-good movies. That was the blueprint of his generation and Tony followed it with his college sweetheart.

But instead of having kids and a house in the ‘burbs, Tony’s sweetheart supported his own love child: a successful firm he’d started from the ground up during college. Days bleeding into the other, design and blueprints and dreaming in another language. 

She would joke and say that it was truly the love of his life before her. Tony would thank her for being willing to share it, even if she didn’t know the first thing about architecture or design. The love he had for her was not conditional on her understanding him or his work; her backing was instrumental, her confidence in him, priceless. 

Within five years of starting the company they had one hundred employees and offices in two cities across America. They lived modestly, however comfortably, owning a couple of real estate properties over New York and Philadelphia, paying off both mortgages and living the way they’d dreamed since their first date over cup ramen. 

They both enjoyed the benefits of his hard work and Tony was happy to provide.

Even if providing meant that his personal time was the one commodity he could rarely afford.

Providing meant long nights in the office, paperwork over dinner, phone calls cutting through movies. Providing meant they spent a month-long lavish getaway in Europe, dining on salty prosciutto and creamy camembert by day and indulging on Sangiovese at night, falling into bed with flushed cheeks and rolling in the silky hotel sheets, hearing their own rapture off seventeenth century arched ceilings. 

If it meant Tony had to work throughout the night typing furiously and on off-timezone calls whilst she slept beside him, then he was okay with that. If it meant that she would never go without, Tony would give her the shirt off his back. For her, he’d do anything. 

He _did_ everything.

Sometimes he quietly longed for the days back when neither of them had a dime to their name. A part of him yearned for the coziness of their tiny apartment, the way they would huddle around the stove for warmth in the mornings, unable to afford the excessive heating bills, fingers fluttering over the blue flame. Their small, shitty bed just meant that they had to cuddle closer together to avoid the springs, he was happiest, then.

But endearing himself to the past bore no fruit - and he wouldn’t give it up for the way she seemed to flourish through their success. Besides, he didn’t mind the sports cars or not wondering if his next cheque would cover their bills and expenses. 

There was a calm about his future for the first time since he was that poor kid from New Jersey, trying to keep up with a society keen on tripping him over. 

They spent twenty years together. 

After their twentieth anniversary - a week at the Maldives - Tony still felt like the luckiest man alive with her by his side. He’d had everything he ever wanted, everything his dear old dad said he’d never have: A wife he adored, a thriving business and friends he cherished. 

So, naturally, everything went to shit.

One day Tony had stayed late at the office, as usual, the last man standing. An unsuspecting Monday, nowhere else to be, trading back and forth texts with his wife whilst working on an acquisition proposal. He’d left the office sometime after midnight, walking down the empty streets to his parked car.

As he’d reached for his keys he’d felt the cold press of a gun to the back of his neck and --

\-- Tony doesn’t really like to talk about it or think about it or be reminded about it --

Anyway, he was abruptly pistol whipped and forced into the trunk of his own car.

Half-conscious and head throbbing with both the attack and subsequent panic, he’d been driven to a location and dragged into a warehouse where three others waited. They’d taken everything off his body except for his clothes, shoes, wallet, phone, integrity - they’d even taken his wedding ring. After giving him another shiner he’d been tied to a pole and left.

He was left there for eight days.

Eight days of yelling himself hoarse, tugging at his binds until the rope cut into his skin until they chafed and bled sticky streams down his arms. Eight days without food and pitiful sips of coppery tasting water, sitting in his own piss and filth.

When the first responders finally found him, freeing him from his bonds and getting him on a stretcher, he’d been delirious. Light burned his eyes and focusing on what was real was an impossible task. Dipping in and out of consciousness he lashed out at the paramedics, at the nurses, at the doctors, so sure he was still at the behest of his captors. Eventually, he came to. Mostly. 

But his wife had been by his bedside. He had the best medical care on the east coast. 

Anyway, the perpetrators were eventually apprehended and tried and jailed and --

Tony doesn’t like to talk about it. In fact he talked about it a total of two occasions. Once, to the police, the second time to the prosecutors.

He’s fine now.

But he’ll admit that it messed him up real good back then. It took the shine right off the chrome and the glitter out of the stars and he couldn’t look in the mirror and see the person he was before it happened. He pushed the corners of his lips up with his fingers and it still looked wrong, something in his eyes made him look like something out of a thriller movie.

It wasn’t that he didn’t try -- at the behest of his wife Tony went to exactly four entire therapy sessions before he deemed himself recovered from the whole ordeal.

So maybe he didn’t quite heal right. And maybe he had recurring nightmares and intrusive flashbacks and lashed out at people when he wasn’t supposed to, he was still functional. 

And it wasn’t that he had _post traumatic stress_ , or whatever they called it. It was just that whenever he was in wide, open spaces Tony stopped breathing. That’s all. But his wife was there to calm him down -- or his friends learned how to deal with noises that set him off and stopped asking him to go out because he couldn’t cope with the press of a crowd. 

It wasn’t that he had _anxiety._ He was just a different person now. 

So, Tony worked more. 

He revelled in that corner office, dedicating himself to distraction and the pursuit of excellence. He pulled all-nighters - sometimes three nighters - guzzling back coffee and energy drinks, wrote up code and contracts as he sipped bourbon at his desk. It wasn’t until his CFO, Pepper, took him by the ear and dragged him out of the office that he ever went home.

But the fruits of his labour were there, new clients, new projects. Business was booming. Their profits near went up by twenty-four percent in six months. Tony felt justified. Justified was probably the only thing he was feeling, if he was honest. But it was all he could do, work hard.

Maybe he’d worked too hard, because six months after his ordeal he came home and walked in on his wife fucking their accountant in their marital bed. 

“Oh,” Tony had said, turning around and closing the bedroom door behind him.

The divorce wasn’t pretty. 

Both foolishly in love and poor as paupers when they wed, they’d never signed a prenup. Tony had never thought to, even after they’d made a name for themselves. 

They say that love is blind and Tony had never truly knew what that meant, not until he saw how much she had changed right under his nose. The worst part was the disorientation, of having the rug pulled under him -- and for the second time in as many years he felt the sky falling down and it kept falling down. 

Maybe she’d changed when Tony did, when he came out of that warehouse a little less the person he’d been before. Or maybe she’d been this way the whole time - in any case, Tony hadn’t anticipated how ruthlessly she came for everything he was worth. She didn’t hold her punches. He used to love that about her.

Love, blind. Whatever.

She deemed him mentally incapacitated and unable to carry out his duties as CEO of the company. Despite his protests to the contrary, she’d had a court appointed shrink give a trembling testimony to the same. Tony tried to get an independent shrink to invalidate her claims but he couldn’t sit through an assessment long enough without his lungs failing to work properly.

She cited his wilfully untreated mental illness conjunctively with her involvement and emotional labour as reasons to take control of the business. 

Tony laughed, watching his life’s work slip out of his hands.

She’d _wept_ during the proceedings. Lawyers passed her tissues as she told them all about his erratic behaviour, how she’d become fearful for her safety. Tony could only watch, speechless and hurting, as the perfect spools of his life unravelled faster than he’d ever thought possible, no chance of stopping.

Meetings after meetings with lawyers and mediators, a veritable drain on both Tony’s spirit and bank account, they finally reached a settlement. To Tony’s dismay she would take ownership of the business. She’d get take sole ownership of both their properties.

“She doesn’t even know the difference between a jack arch and Jack Daniels,” Tony said after he finished laughing, the rustling of pens and paper the anthem of his undoing. 

The thing about trauma was that you go to exercise impulses you’ve been burying for years - and spite was something that Tony had missed the burn on. So, knowing a losing battle when he saw one, had Tony petty in his grief. With a shrug he’d acquiesced and requested everything else.

She could have the business and the houses, he’d take all of the things that made her happy - the paintings, the antiques, the stupid silverware and crystalware she seemed to adore so much. He’d take the jewellery, the sports cars, along with every single knick knack that she ever fawned over. She could take his pride and joy and he would take all the material things she coveted.

He’d moved out into some shitty apartment, took stock of all the bullshit he couldn’t fit into it and stuffed all of his winnings into storage. 

The apartment he’d rented whilst he figured out how to jigsaw his life back together came with a nice bathtub. Tony spent a lot of time staring at it. Rhodey and Pepper walked in on him once the first time he’d used it, like, really used it. A welfare check. 

That was two years ago.

But Tony can still taste the copper in the water, the rust between his lips. Every time he so much as breathed all he could smell was the sulphur in the air, the caustic fumes of everything crashing that stung his eyes. 

In one fell swoop Tony had lost his career, his wife and his house. He’d sold the cars, the crystal chandeliers, the original artworks, syphoning some of it going towards his legal and medical bills. The rest went towards booze. And more booze on top of that.

Six months after their separation was about the time that his friends and former associates found themselves weary of his perpetual trainwreck. Tony didn’t bounce back like the weather forecasted. He cashed in his favours and found himself destitute when he spent it all on alcohol and bail and bills. 

Still smarting from the fall, Tony couldn’t find it within himself to be ashamed the fourth or fifth time that Rhodey had to pick him up from the county jail. He tried to find it within himself to feel bad, even when Rhodey was the only friend that he had left, except there was no more feeling bad. Every second of every day he felt this unshakeable badness, like rot on a crop of apples. There was no deeper feeling of bad he could sink to, every part of him infecting everyone around him.

They called it drunk and disorderly. Public intoxication. A disturbance. 

Tony called it just trying to get by in a life that was just as empty as he was. It's not like he was pissing on trees. Okay, maybe twenty year old brickwork was a target, and okay, maybe elderly couples were drunkenly heckled, so? They were old, doesn't that come with one-on-one jackass experience?

“Yeah, cry me a river, Ivanka,” his friend shook his head. “Save the poetics for your next slam meet up. I know you’re hurting but you can’t keep _doing_ this.” 

Driving him back to whatever hovel Tony had been housing in, it was probably fair to say that Rhodey was less than impressed. Tony was used to that, that was Rhodey’s overall impression of Tony in the entire time they’d been friends. Walking him to his front door, Tony had been slapped on the back and compassionately advised to get off the booze.

“You gotta get off the booze, Tones,” Rhodey had said. “I ain't telling you to go sober but you cant drink an entire liquor aisle every night.”

“Yeah,” Tony had agreed.

Agreed was a loose term. There was so much margin for interpretation in what he had said and honestly - _honestly_ \- Tony had the best intentions. Stop drinking, start schmoozing. Get life on that upward swing, get the ball to fall close to the hole if you can’t get it in one.

But something inside him had been rapidly decaying, and so he consumed as if trying to fill the yawning void - but instead of trying to outrun it, Tony slid and further became part of it. 

It was funny, how quickly the bloom fell from the rose. 

Tony spent months in that deep, dark pit. He drank and slept his way through nameless faces, tried to reclaim his body in someone else's, tried to find clarity in whatever substance he could afford. He had months where he could barely remember where he had been, a remiss traveller to his own life.

Most of the people he used to call his friends had left. You know. Friends, but not like chummy-break-you-out-of-county friends. The ones that couldn’t stick around for his pity parties but used to show up to his dinner parties. All ark, no flood.

Even a couple of the good ones, that couldn’t watch him destroy himself anymore without trying to get better. Tony just wanted a break, just wanted the nightmares and heartache to stop.

Time and its appropriation caught up.

\-----

It was Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers who were instrumental in his uprising. 

After Tony was arrested for the fifth time and was facing something more serious than a night in the naughty corner Rhodey and his lawyer had stepped in and gotten him a deal: Meetings with other folks suffering from PTSD or three months in jail.

Tony wanted jail, but then Rhodey had given him that _look_ , so.

Anyways, there he’d met Steve and his partner Bucky and that was the beginning of his so-called ascension from the ashes.

Despite many hungover protests and scathing diatribes, Tony was dragged to the gym at all ungodly hours by one or the other. He looks back at it fondly now, but at the time there was nothing endearing in the way Steve would show up in the dark hours of the morning. It was resentment he’d felt when Steve pulled Tony off the couch, sometimes even _dressed_ him and herded him out of the house. At the early hours in the gym there was almost no one to see Tony freak out. 

Without the aid of booze and benzos all of the noise in Tony’s head demanded to be heard, all of the nightmarish kaleidoscope memories had his breath caught in his chest. It was Steve and Bucky that talked him down. It was them that chased after him when he needed a place to hide. It was those two that showed him more compassion than exasperation that he’d received from most. 

They pushed him, even when he tried to push them away. 

Oh, did they push. 

In a series of demanding circuits and exercises, Tony was pushed to the brink of tears more than once. He was pushed to dry-heaving, the build-up of lactic acid making him reassess all of his choices - especially the bottles of whiskey he’d had only the night before.

It did not feel good in the beginning, like, _at all_.

But after a while it started to. The burn, the post-workout endorphins, the triumph at hurdling over his own personal bests. It started to feel like he was human again, capable of achieving and creating and that he was worth something. So Tony worked out, willingly. And once he stopped running his mouth there was a sense of camaraderie, their conversations more banter than bitching.

Tony got into the best shape of his life, started taking his friends advice and really thought about getting his shit together.

Once the cash dried up and the alimony ceased, Tony himself in another spot of strife. He tried and failed to get a position in his own field, blacklisted and barred from his fall from grace. So he took odd jobs. Delivering newspapers, handing out flyers. Anything.

Then the odd jobs didn’t cover rent so he found himself on Steve and Bucky’s couch. 

After lamenting his loss of direction and financial freedom, Bucky refers to Tony’s newly ripped abs, his bulging biceps, and not-so-jokingly suggests Tony take up stripping in the interim until he gets back on his feet. 

“Don’t front,” Bucky had said. “I’ve seen you admiring your own reflection, damn narcissist.”

“You created a monster,” Tony replied. “But, like, a ripped one.”

Bucky’s more than happy to admit stripping is how he got through his own rough patch, when veterans affairs didn’t quite cover everything, referring Tony his agency with a promise that he will provide a recommendation. 

Tony is both shameless, because getting paid to be admired is a dream - and also nervous because, bar the odd appreciative onlooker, since his divorce Tony can’t tell if his greying temples or the persistent fat on his thighs is attractive or just tolerable. 

Turns out it’s _really_ fucking attractive.

After his debut - a bi couple that held a bi-bachelor party - Tony sells out every Thursday to Monday for twelve months straight _in advance_. 

As the requests come in, his fees get higher and higher, his time and body coveted by a broad clientele. To his bewilderment, there was a lot of people willing to pay good money for his body and what he thought was some awkward gyrating. 

Turns out there’s a market for men over forty in the ol’ stripper industry. He worked a couple of clubs, found a friend in pole dancing, earned himself the ‘Iron Man’ title in those establishments, but it never really suited him all that much. Maybe it was his apparent narcissism come to play, but he liked the home-visits most, being the star of the show.

Tony liked being there to delight, to titillate, to tease his clients. He _relished_ in the cacophony of squeals, the raucous cheering, how his clients would look upon him with a mix of embarrassment and hunger, some shy, others confident enough to reach out and touch. God, how he savoured the unfiltered arousal, the way their mouths would drop just slightly when he started his routine. 

It was safe, harmless. Ego-boosting.

So that had been his life for a while, getting paid exorbitant amounts of cash plus tips from all walks of society - and he lived comfortably. 

Bit-by-bit Tony started paying his friends back and rented his own place the next town over where he could make new memories, visit new places. It was closer to the city and whilst the two-bedroom with stained carpets was a far cry from the three-storey monstrosity he used to live in, it was home.

It took some time, but eventually the smoke cleared and he was able to start his own IT consulting business too - the clients that came on board - along with his _night job_ \- provided a kind of financial freedom that he didn’t need to perform as often as he was. 

Tony could be selective with his gigs and suddenly his weekends were free. Not that Tony had recovered his social life. There were no more cocktail parties.

That was it, that was his life now. He slept around a bit initially in the roller-coaster whir of alcohol and grief, trying to replace the impression of his wife's touch, the ghost of her sure fingertips on his skin. He’d even had a couple of follow up-dates, all aborted attempts at relationships he hightailed out of when they started to get interested in more than his body.

So, he was a mess, okay. But he was doing better. At least he could go outside his house these days without the sky falling down. 

And you know what that was? Progress.

\-----

It’s been two days since Rhodey left and there is something itching under his skin. Maybe it was the point that was made about erecting a mausoleum in what should have been Tony’s fresh field.

Sighing, Tony spies his ex-wife's hideous coasters that he refuses to use on the oak coffee table she used to love, that he now loves to litter with condensation stains from perspiring beer bottles. He observes the gaudy ornaments that clutter the various flat surfaces, the artwork that he used to lovingly tolerate. He hates all of it now.

Looking at the remnants of his former life, they used to feel like hard-won trophies that he’d wrestled for, awards of spite, prizes from his resentment. They adorned every surface of his new home, speckled freckles in his new life in some kind of a parody of revenge.

His best friend definitely has a point.

He throws out the coasters and calls that progress too. 

\-----

Tony goes to the next meeting. 

Hands trembling, he can’t quite bring himself to talk, but Rhodey’s hand slapping on his back in welcome is just as cathartic.

\-----

It’s not that therapy isn’t useful.

It’s not that working out was a replacement for medication he should probably be taking. 

But when Tony couldn’t make himself visit a counsellors office or a meeting and talk he _could_ drag himself to a treadmill. And if he couldn’t get out of the house then he damn well could pick up the weights under his bed.

Sue him, alright? He’d had his entire life shattered, re-arranged and lost the two loves of his life. So, maybe he wasn’t healing in the way a court-mandated psychiatrist might prescribe but he was doing just fine, thank you. Traditional and linear can kiss his ass.

Near enough is good enough.

\-----

While he begins a slow clean-up of his post-life-life he works on his consulting business, signs a lucrative long-term deal with an environmentally conscious start-up company and accepts a few new bookings for his other job. 

Next weekend he books himself in to entertain a bachelorette party for a bride-to-be named Tracey Koleski, one hour, a moderate amount of guests. Par for the course. He peruses her photo and the information the maid of honour has kindly sent over. Getting married at thirty-seven to an accountant named Dave. Wow.

The next is - oh, well, that’s rare. An exclusive party for the partners and associates of a city-based law firm. Hello tips and tricks. An hour booking. Tony goes through their website, winces at the slew of photos of balding white men and hopes the tips are as big as their wallets, if the high rise office is of any indication.

Third is a twenty-first birthday for some guy named Peter Parker. His cheapest tier at thirty minutes, quite a few party-goers expected. 

The last one was weird, however quaint he found the alliteration. Who named their kid _Peter_ since the eighties? Wasn’t Archer or Jackson all the rage recently? 

Whatever. They’d supplied his twenty-five-hundred down payment upon booking, he wasn’t about to complain.

\-----

His friends, though. Complaining about them was open-season.

“Did you dye your hair?” Bucky looks at Tony curiously, stabbing his fork into the bloated poached egg to watch the yolk bleed out onto the toasted bread beneath.

“Yes?” Tony answers cautiously, fingers flying to his darkened hairline, suddenly self-conscious that there was a tell-tale dye stain lingering on his skin somewhere. 

“Looks good,” Bucky mumbles, shoving a generous chunk of his breakfast into his mouth, gesturing vaguely at Tony’s hairline. “Distinguished ‘n shit.”

“Babe,” Steve admonishes.

“Stevie,” Bucky replies, leaning in for a placating kiss that the blond easily returns.

“ _James_.”

“It looks better when the grey grows in,” Tony blurts, spooning a mountain of beans into his mouth and talking around it. “Stop checking me out.”

“I’m not checking you out. You’re such a vain bitch.”

“Steve, I think your boyfriend is attracted to me. You should probably look into that, not that you could blame him.”

Typical fare for them, really. A post work-out brunch at their regular diner, filling up on greasy potato and eggs and protein-laden smoothies. They didn’t get to do it as often anymore, now that Tony lived on his own again, but they made time at least once a week to sit down, catch up and shoot the shit. 

Bucky and Steve were high school sweethearts. They grew up together, served in the armed forces together and, in Tony’s educated opinion, were in love to a nauseating degree. They made dumb eyes and even dumber faces at each other, as if the world outside of them seemed immaterial. It made Tony sick just looking at it.

So what if it made Tony the third wheel? He owed these two the world, so he could shelve his impotent yearning. Even if their lovey-dovey, ooey-gooey PDA antics made him feel marginally inadequate.

They were regulars at the meetings, back when Tony used to actually go to them. All three of them met up with friend and meeting organiser, Sam, for drinks afterwards and the rest was history. They’d given him a roof over his head when he had none and motivation to get out of bed, even if he was sometimes dragged out of it.

It’s not that Rhodey wasn’t there for him. But it was harder. Profoundly more complicated. He was married to Pepper, and Pepper was now the CFO of the company his wife now owns. It wasn't personal, it was business - it’s just… complicated. 

Bucky and Steve did everything together. Partners in business and life, they ran an art gallery downtown showcasing some of the most exquisite canvas and metal works Tony had ever seen. Sometimes it makes him look back on his own failed marriage and wonder what more he could have done to have what they have. Or if it was ever meant to be at all.

“So,” Steve says, wiping his mouth with a paper napkin before settling it on the plate. “We have some news.”

“Let me guess, you’re pregnant,” Tony points his finger, wagging it at the unimpressed couple. “Steve, you old dog, don’t you know you’re supposed to make him an honest man before putting a bun in the oven?”

“Speaking _of_ , smart-ass,” Bucky cuts in. 

Curious, Tony watches as the man lifts the silver chain around his neck so it’s no longer hidden under his collar. For a moment curiosity bleeds into confusion until Tony sees it - dangling next to his dog tags is a gold ring, embellished with a stunning ruby and sapphire duo.

The two look pleased as punch at Tony’s surprise, his jaw going slack as the jewellery _literally_ _glints_ in the sunlight shining through the diner windows. Steve wraps an arm around his lovers shoulders, kissing his temple and beaming.

“Holy shit,” Tony manages after a moment of inelegant gaping. “You guys are -- wow. Okay.”

“I came home to a trail of roses,” Bucky recounts with his eyes trained on Steves’, “this dumb schmuck was kneeling in the bedroom already crying like a fucking loser -- “

“ -- You cried first,” Steve interrupts. “Don’t front.”

Bucky rolls his eyes, focusing his attention on Tony. “He cried first.”

“No, _I’m_ going to cry first,” Tony cuts in with a withering drawl, smiling despite himself. “First, congratulations are in order. Congrats! Second, where are the shots? Why are we in a diner when we could be celebrating in a bar?”

Steve stares at him. “Because it’s ten in the morning?”

Tony blinks. “Right,” he says, as if the concept of time has ever meant anything to him. “When’s the date? Am I invited? Please tell me I’m going to be your flower girl, I’d be so offended if I wasn’t at least delegated to throwing dead foliage at people in a fabulous dress.”

The couples eyes glaze as if imagining it for just a split second. 

“Actually,” Bucky begins, trailing the ring on his necklace with his finger and sharing a glance with his partner.

“We thought you’d be Bucks best man,” Steve finishes, his cool-blue eyes resting on Tony's face, quietly gauging his reaction. 

“Oh,” Tony blinks, fork in mid-air. He's not sure what his face is doing, something twitches, but he's not sure what. A prolonged moment of uncertain silence threads between them.

“...Is that okay, man? You don’t have to say yes if it makes you uncomfortable.”

“Let him process,” Steve shushes his partner, squeezing his shoulder. 

His hands shake with unidentified emotion, so he lowers his fork to the plate with a clang. Tony clears his throat and blinks back the prickle in his eyes. “Of course I’ll be your best man, Buckaroo. No take backsies. I mean, as long as you don’t hire me for your bachelor party,” he adds airily, snorting at his own joke to hide the lump forming in his throat. It earns him an appreciative laugh, the couple threading their fingers together and sharing a chaste kiss. 

Tony’s happy for them. 

No, really, he is. Thrilled. Over the moon, profoundly enthused even. 

These two fools have been to hell and back. They came out of that fire forged into something stronger, brighter. A couple of years ago he might have been the type of burned cynic who would have openly scoffed at the thought of marriage, of forevers and happily-ever-afters, using his own anecdotal evidence as a reason to decry the idea of lasting love.

Now he’s still a stone-cold cynic. It’s on brand, okay? He is Tony Stark after all - but it’s more born out of the belief that that kind of love just isn’t in the cards for _him_. He had it once and they tore each other apart - and sometimes he thinks that's just what his love does to people, makes them manic and bloodthirsty, turning their hearts into stone. 

Maybe love only blooms when you’re young?

Mostly, the thought just makes Tony ache.

His arms miss wrapping themselves around another at night. And as much as he’s enjoyed his one-night-stands, they don’t stay and Tony doesn’t want them to - doesn’t want to memorise the contours of one body for one night, to mentally check out on intimacy. He wants what he’s always done - provide and cherish. 

Because despite being shredded apart and barely patched together again, Tony’s stupid, stupid heart still _longs_. It still runs towards something other than just surviving at war with the rest of his body, the body that just keeps standing still while the world moves on.

It’s taken him this long to feel like his spirit is whole again. It seems stupid to risk it all, just to shovel paper hearts into the void. Despite the last few years of his life being the hardest, Tony feels like the best person he’s ever been. 

Looking at the two lovers on the other side of the table, Tony thinks maybe he, too, was forged into something different, rendered in the fire into a new form. 

The tug-of-war inside of him nudges his feet so they’re aimed in the direction that his heart has been trying to drag him to all along. In the dark nights, cigarette smoke curling into the sky, it whispers for him to take a step.

But all of that can wait, he thinks. 

He’s got a bachelorette party tonight and some manscaping he’s thoroughly reluctant to commence. 

Life waits for no one. 

\-----

Bride-to-be Tracey is _very_ appreciative of his efforts.

Or so Tony thinks, if the way her eyes widen in wonderment and her hands eagerly roam across his skin is of any indication. Clients like her are eager to please, they’re not some build-a-twink looking for a daddy, or some single and lonely someone looking for something warm to touch. The Tracey’s of the world just want the guy who is impossibly flirtatious, one last hurrah at having someone attractive behaving like they’re maniacally attracted to you before the diligent pursuit of monogamy. 

Tony had arrived to a caucus of tipsy women in what Tony has dubbed his slutty construction worker outfit. Baggy jeans, a black undershirt, a yellow construction hat and a toolbelt that slung low on his hips, fake drill swaying pendulously against his thigh. 

He even has a prop sledgehammer that he drapes over his shoulders. Adopting his most stern look Tony swaggers closer to the bride, winks at her and says all cocksure: _are you looking to get pounded?_

It’s not his finest, but it works a charm. 

She gasps and giggles, as if his appearance - _a stripper! at a bachelorette party!_ \- were such a surprise. So he starts with coy touches to her shoulders, a purposeful finger dragging slowly along the curve of her collarbone, circling her where she sits. With Marvin Gaye as his back up, Tony dips his hips, licking his lips as he slips off his fluorescent yellow overjacket to fall into a heap at his feet. 

That earns him his first round of appreciative applause.

Hands firm on her hips he guides her to a chair in the centre of the room, smiling devilishly down at her, eyes twinkling with intent. She drops to the seat delightedly and spreads her legs invitingly, encouraged by the cheers of her fellow partygoers. Letting the notes of the music streaming from the speakers be his guide, Tony playfully places his construction cap on her head, tilting it to the side with a charming smile. 

He steps back, hips swaying to the beat, fingers teasing at the waistband of his pants, working the crowd into a frenzy as he palms his crotch. Catching her gaze, Tony slides up the hem of his shirt, giving a peek of his abs before lifting the shirt off entirely. Whirling it around his finger, Tony grins, flinging his shirt towards the screaming crowd. 

So it begins.

Tracey gets a little more handsy that night than what Tony was strictly paid for but the tips he receives more than made up for it. He also gets free drinks and a lipstick stain on his cheek as compensation for the gratuitous groping that isn’t quite in the fine print.

When Tony goes home that night he struggles to locate that sense of accomplishment, that job well done, bone-deep satisfaction he would get from gigs before. Even when he finally takes the cock ring off (no one likes a stripper with a limp dick) he is barely interested in finishing himself off, fingers grazing over himself disinterestedly before twisting the cold water on instead.

Maybe it’s all of this wedding talk - seeing Steve and Bucky going forward with their lives, not just moving on but moving up - and even his client tonight, still clearly smitten with her husband-to-be if the way she gushed over him to Tony after his performance.

And maybe when he got home with no one to talk to except the television and that awful portrait of some seventeenth century noble his ex-wife loved, the loneliness was felt more acutely than before. 

He’d spent so much time over the last few years being scrambled. After the incident and the divorce Tony had been turned inside-out and. Unrecognisable. Too busy rearranging his insides to keep himself together. 

There’s a runaway feeling in his chest, like a loose thread, and Tony paws at it. Now that the dust had settled he can’t keep ignoring the fact that something inside him wasn’t put together right. 

A cheap bottle of whisky and reruns of The Nanny helps soothe the stirring beast for the night.

\-----

The next morning Tony wakes with his head pounding and the taste of vomit in his mouth.

He doesn’t even know what time it is, too drunk the night before to remember to charge his phone. He opens up his laptop instead, which turns out to be a rightful mistake when the light causes his brain to pound against his skull. Charging his phone turns out to be a mistake too, Tony realizes. Feeling sick, shame welling up in his chest, he wants to disintegrate into the air and never reform; to his horror, Tony discovers that he’d drunk-texted half of his remaining friends. 

And Pepper.

**9:14pm > u can tell her i sed fuck her, wht a wretch**

**9:14pm > i mean wench**

**9:15pm > same dif**

**10:08pm > soz hd a few lol**

Jesus christ.

The responses vary from amusement to concern, and in Peppers case, the lack of response is rather telling. Words like _yikes, shit_ , and _fuck_ reverberate around his mind as he stares blankly at his phone, wondering if maybe he should just crawl under his house and never come out. Putting his head into his hands instead, Tony sighs into his palms.

Times like these are always junctions. There are forks in moments and Tony old enough to recognise hot spots of chance and opportunity, or steep slopes of inexorable melancholy. 

Eating dry toast over the sink to appease his hungover induced nausea Tony deliberates on his his life choices, hyper-focusing on the gaudy decor he can’t stand to look at it anymore. 

He takes the awful portrait of the seventeenth-century noble to the thrift store. 

It makes him feel lighter.

\-----

Nothing about recovery feels good to him at first visit. The first workouts, reachouts, penance, none of it feels like catharsis at first glance. But he does it, because eventually, through practice, it begins to feel like habit, and habit begins to scoop away the sediments of all of his bad parts.

So Tony goes to the next meeting, hands trembling, sick to his stomach from the alcohol he’d shot just minutes before. 

Rhodey smiles at him encouragingly. Tony still doesn’t go up and speak, last nights nightmares still clogged in the drain of his throat - but he stays the entire time and doesn’t go out for drinks after, or try and bury his memories in the comforting heat of a stranger's body.

Tony thinks maybe that’s okay.

\-----

“I’m really proud of you, man,” Rhodey says as he helps Tony move out the coffee table and bookcase into the hired trailer. That too is going to the thrift store, too scuff-marked and stained from Tony’s tender, loving care to have any resale value. 

“I told you I was only a regular type of mess,” he groans, heaving the heavy table onto the tail of the trailer with a clang.

“My mistake,” Rhodey concedes, closing the metal gate and leaning against it, wiping a bead of sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.

The sun is a brutal mistress, beating down upon them relentlessly, heat rising from the roads in waves. Even the evergreens in his yard look tired and sad. 

Tony went all out last weekend and tried to pull out the green thumb stuck in his ass, planting seeds for the spring and uprooting soil for freshly planted lavenders and jasmines. Tony likes the smell, but two weeks after situating them in the bed in his front yard the burgeoning browning edges makes him frown. He probably should have watered them or set up a sprinkler system or something.

He’ll do that tomorrow. Life waits for no one, after all.

“You get invited to Steve and Bucks wedding?” Tony asks, leaning back on the grate next to his friend, closing his eyes against the relentless sun for just a moment, listens to the sound of suburbia, cars and kids and birds, for just a moment.

“Mhmm,” Rhodey affirms, shaking his head when Tony offers him a cigarette. “Heard you got made best man.”

“Yes, but so did bird-brain Wilson,” Tony rebuts, tilting his head to the side. “Based on that, I can’t say the standard is all that high.”

“Shut up, you love that guy.”

Tony sends him a look. “Love is a tad strong word, isn’t it?”

“Is it?”

“He makes an adequate meatloaf, the rest of him is debatable,” Tony gruffly concedes, lighting the end of his cigarette, struggling with the breeze for a moment before the flame catches. He takes a deep, calming drag, exhaling towards the clouds before answering. "His sense of humour is like trying to jerk off with sandpaper."

“Keep telling yourself that.”

“I shall.”

“Uh-huh. When is it? April?”

“Fucked if I know,” Tony huffs, closing his eyes. The smell of the fauna mixed with the nicotine feels like when he was six, hanging around his mother in the backyard chasing beetles as she smoked and gossiped with the neighbour over the fence. “Why - you wanna be my plus one?”

Rhodey huffs a laugh, tipping his head back to peer at the sky, sweat dotting his forehead. “You know you’re my best gal, Tones, but the wife might have some objections.” 

Tony places a hand on his chest, pouting in mock heartbreak. “Here I thought that you actually loved me. I already bought us matching cuff links.”

“Did you really?”

“Yes,” Tony lies, watching his friends expression carefully, the corners of his lips begging to be twitched upwards. “They’re tiny, cartoon ejaculating penises.” 

“I’d apologize, except I’m not actually sorry,” Rhodey wipes his brow, smiling nonetheless at the image presented. “I’m sure you’ll find another sucker to handle your cock for you.”

Tony snorts. It’s a good dirty joke, except - well, yeah. Cock handling aside, the glaring vacancy inside of his chest lights up like a neon motel sign, a poorly displayed advertisement that his wretched incompleteness is begging for a booking. “Not in the near future buddy,” Tony admits, tone more solemn than what he’d been aiming for. “Just old righty and lefty. Sometimes both at the same time.”

His friend looks at him for a long, scrutinizing moment, coming to some quiet conclusion before clasping Tony's shoulder, squeezing it lightly. “You’ll get there, man.”

Tony clears his throat, giving a hollow impression of a smile and heading back towards the house.

“Thanks, Dr Phil. So, do you want a beer or not?”

Rhodey agrees. They drink until Pepper needs to pick her husband up, rolling up in a 2014 Mercedes A180, windows down to express exasperation at them both and it feels like the old days, but better. She doesn’t mention the text. Or her. Tony’s embarrassed as Rhodey stumbles into the car, but terribly grateful. Something in his heart aches and eases at the same time of the familiarity of it all.

After considerable deliberation Tony decides that he’s going to keep that crystal bowl-turned-ashtray and the antique mahogany dresser that he doesn’t entirely hate. In fact, he recalls the latter to be something that he actually had the final say on. 

It’s okay to have some remnants of his old life that he actually likes, surely. Isn’t that the point of all moving up, to accept that not all of it was bad?

See? Progress.

\-----

The weekend after he clears his house of all the phantoms and fills it with items that are old, new, borrowed and blue. 

Well it’s more like a grey-blue, _slate grey_ or whatever. It’s a set of dishes that he picked up from the thrift store that are kind of hideous but he loves them. Everything he owns is mismatched and it brings colour to his life that chrome and magazine inspired interior design missed.

He buys a cheap new coffee table and spends an afternoon painting it a garish hot-rod-red and plops it into the centre of his living room. Once the paint is dry he takes great satisfaction in resting his feet on it - she would have _hated_ it but Tony could not be more delighted. It’s his.

It’s so funny how he thought acquiescence was the same thing as compromise. 

\-----

The lavenders continue to brown around their edges despite Tony’s belated however sincere waterings and so when he’s not working he scrolls through gardening websites and feels simultaneously old and young when he has to google _how to maintain a garden_.

The websites don’t offer much that he didn’t already know. He figures maybe he should go talk to a real life person who knows this kind of thing but then he’d have to one, leave his house, and two, talk to a real person. So that option gets shelved super quick.

He goes to the gym with Steve and Bucky and tries not to notice their adoring gazes, tries to be quiet when Bucky kisses the ketchup off the corner of Steve's mouth at the following brunch.

They’re happy.

Tony had that. 

Despite, or maybe in spite of all the alarm bells, despite the insidious voice that says he’s too damaged, that Tony is both too much and not enough, he wants it again. It’s fire in his gut, fuel that gets him out of bed. If there’s anything that Tony does really well, it’s spite - even when it’s aimed at himself.

Afterwards he drives past their old house in the town they lived in together and is encouraged when he feels nothing. No mourning, no wanting her back. He hates her a little, still, but it isn’t all consuming anymore.

When Tony drives back home - _home_ \- windows down, one hand on the wheel, he remembers staying up all night in a beautiful Italian city to work while she slept and he laughs. 

Sometimes the only way to win is to lose.

\-----

Tony shakes off the dregs of a still lingering nightmare, cold ashy fingertips in his mind of a dark warehouse and the chill of the concrete. The gasp got stuck in his throat when he woke and he coughs, coughs, coughs so he can try to suck in air. 

He drank some water and spent the afternoon planting roses for the coming spring. 

\-----

Lawyers.

They tip _great_.

But it’s the only thing about them that Tony could attribute the word ‘great’ to, the width of their wallet and Tony’s ability to seduce them. It’s not exactly their compassionate, benevolent personalities that endear such people to portfolios like taxation law and property law. 

Also, lawyers? A ton of book smarts, brimming to the top with academic excellence. Common sense? Not so much.

Not only did they fail to inform Tony that they would be hiring him along with a stripper from _another agency_ , but more than once were his rules on personal boundaries breached by wandering hands and prodding fingers, wandering and prodding where they shouldn’t be, where they were told _not_ to be. 

Tony’s rules on personal boundaries were considered skeletal as it was, which meant they were really out of line.

Tony reaches behind him to grip the wrist of whoever owns the fingers that are currently stroking at his hole through his thong, as if trying to rub a magic lamp.

“Now, now Humbert,” Tony squeezes the intruders wrist, sliding off the lap of the man he was grinding on to stare at the prick head on. The bad-touch-man beams when Tony turns, and no joke, _licks his lips_. 

“Wow,” Tony blinks, squeezing the man’s arm tightly. Do we need a refresher on the rules or do I need to break this dainty little wrist for you?”

“Don’t play coy, sweetheart,” the man says, using his other hand to poke at Tony’s bare side.

“The latter then,” Tony shakes his head. Stalking forward, brain repeating the phrase _don't murder, murder, don't, don't do it_ , Tony twists the mans wrist and forcing his arm behind his back, eliciting disgruntled groans from the beefy lawyer.

The cheers in the background die down as Tony twists further and the man yelps in pain. The other strippers’ bodyguard steps forward cautiously, but stops when given a warning glare. Tony leans in to the lawyers ear. “The only reason I haven’t snapped each of your fat fingers is because even I’m not stupid enough to hurt you in a room full of pencil pushers. Now my good friend over there is gonna take you outside and you’re going to leave us a really, really nice tip, aren’t you?”

The man begins to object as Tony shoves him forward into the bodyguard who takes him by the scruff of the neck.

“I’m going to need to bleach my asshole after this,” Tony sighs to himself, palming the mans pants to locate his wallet. He helps himself to the cash in there, tucking the notes into his thong. “Well, probably. I mean, look at your nails. Disgusting."

He turns back to the party with a smile, turning up the music on the boom box as he passes. Sliding back onto the man he’d left high and dry before, Tony’s pleased to still find him hard. 

“Now, where we,” he purrs, and just like that, they’re hoodwinked again.

 _Lawyers_ , Tony thinks later, shaking his head as he counts the tips.

\-----

Tony does actually go to a nursery to ask what he should do about his plants. He thinks, sure, pick up some petunias on the way or some shit.

He spends the whole morning prepping for the journey a whole fifteen miles down the road. It’s the kind of morning where Tony would rather smoke an entire pack of cigarettes and drink beer for breakfast, but he got his ass dressed and headed out instead. 

Some of the attention to his personal hygiene was a bit iffy, but he left the house, that’s what counts, right? 

Right.

Out and on the way, the wide-open everything has Tony light-headed and white-knuckling the steering wheel. The towering evergreens on either side of the two-lane road does little to dispel the quell in his body but he does smoke four cigarettes on the fifteen minute drive. 

To drown out his heartbeat he turns up the volume of a Britney Spears playlist that was supposed to be inspiring until he can’t hear the blood rushing in his ears. 

“Stronger than yesterday,” Tony sings to himself between puffs, humming at the lyrics he still hasn’t memorised and increasing the volume until his terrible speakers distort the sound.

When Tony gets to the nursery he immediately picks up a fledgling tomato plant for something to do with his hands and dallies around until his tongue doesn’t feel so thick in his mouth. He mentally rehearses everything he wants to say over and over, miming it for the muscle memory, not sure if he could handle tripping over his own words after all the effort to get here. Soil slips out from the bottom of the pot into Tony’s hand as he paces.

Steeling himself, Tony approaches the counter, his pulse in a drag race against his mind. As Tony rounds the corner towards the cashier, his heart drops to his feet when he notices the line is at least nine people long. 

_Wait it out_ , he tells himself. _One baby-step at a time_. 

Tony lasts five minutes. He offers a wailing infant a sympathetic grimace before turning on his heel and leaving.

The playlist switches to Amy Winehouse on the way home.

\-----

The twenty-first party falls on a particularly sticky-hot Saturday summer night. 

The electric fan whirs tepid air at his back as he flicks through his wardrobe for suitable attire to wear to a twenty-first birthday party.

He pauses at his navy blue police costume and thinks, yeah, that will do. He needs to make sure to notify the organisers in advance of his choice so that he doesn’t _actually_ cause a stir and heads into the shower. 

Hot water pouring over his skin, Tony thinks back to the crappy, blurred image of the birthday boy he was sent by the organisers. There was little to go off, but the kid looked wide-eyed and fair. That’s about as far as Tony could gauge. But if his friends knew the kid well enough to specifically order an older man as his evening delight then, well, there is little questioning of the kids tastes and inclinations.

He skips the razor.

It takes a bit of rummaging around to locate the prop baton, walkie-talkie, handcuffs, stuffing them in his kit along with some fun little items if the mood strikes: a blindfold, a pink feather boa, leather gloves. 

The ride over doesn’t take too long, pulling up near the front of a modest two-storey suburban house. The street is crowded with glossy, expensive cars, twenty-somethings and red solo cup line the sidewalks. Tony can hear the bass pumping in the house from his car. Someone is vomiting behind a tree. 

Jesus, he does not miss this lifestyle at all.

Swinging his kit around his shoulder he ambles up the drive to the door, dodging party-goers in increasing density and intoxication. The organiser seems to be aware of his arrival, if the affirmative text message is any indication. 

Two women are making out against the porch railing, hands in each others hair, separating from each other only to stare at Tony. He nods at them politely, tipping his police hat to them.

He rings the doorbell, sure it’s not going to be heard over whatever bone-rattling track is being blared over the speakers, but a young man opens the door anyway. Curls for days, the man wears a designer tee, a Rolex and a perfectly charming smile as he extends his hand out to shake Tony’s.

“Officer,” he greets over the music, smiling widely. “Harry Osborn. You’re just in time for the birthday cake.”

Ah. The organiser. 

“Lucky me,” Tony nods, looking over Harry’s shoulders to the curious onlookers. “Everything all set up?”

“It is indeed. Birthday boy is all ready for you.”

Tony passes his kit over, stepping through the doorway. “Well then, lead the way Mr. Osborn.”

The police get-up is one of his favourites. The likeness of it to the local law-enforcement uniform is enough to give most people some serious pause and it delights Tony to no end to adopt his most gruff expression as he wades through the curious crowd. The false authority lends him a plethora of amusement, watching expressions go from curious to downright concerned, joints hidden behind backs, music being surreptitiously lowered.

Harry leads him to a room in the back, closing the door behind them in what appears to be a smaller living room. A crowd of twenty or so people are arranged in a haphazard circle around a tall male, broad shoulders and skinny jeans. 

If that weren’t indicative enough of who the birthday boy was, then the plastic, silver tiara perched daintily upon the nest of chestnut curls was.

Tony loudly clears his throat, placing his hands on his belt and looking grimly at the party-goers. The guy wearing the tiara whirls around at the noise, eyes widening when he sights Tony, long limbs freezing mid-flail.

And - okay. Wow.

The guy is, well, stunning. There is no other way to describe it. All flawless, pale skin, big brown eyes and a solidly sculpted jawline. The guys mouth opens slightly, his mouth pink and wet. For a moment Tony forgets that he’s here to work until Harry brushes past his shoulder.

He ambles forward towards the crowd, focusing his eyes on the birthday boy - Peter Parker, Tony remembers - setting his jaw and squaring his shoulders, looking every bit the disgruntled police officer.

“This your party, kid?” He asks Peter, who’s mouth open and closes a few times, struggling to find an answer. Tony tries not to grin at the flustered pink that creeps up on the guys cheeks. He has a healthy fear of authority then, Tony thinks amusedly.

“Y-yes sir,” he stutters. “I mean no, sir, it’s not my house - but, yes, it’s my party. My birthday party. I’m twenty-one.”

Tilting his head to the side Tony lets his hip sway as he stalks forward, running his eyes up and down the younger man, watching as his eyelashes flutter, licking his lips nervously.

“We’ve received several noise complaints,” Tony continues, adopting a stern tone, raising his nose to sniff suspiciously. “Are you aware of the EPA Noise Code that you are in direct violation of?”

Peter begins to look panicked, hands flying up in supplication, brows drawn in contriteness. His voice is soft when he pleads, appropriately cowed, “I’m so sorry, officer! We didn’t mean to disturb anybody, we’ll keep it down, promise. Nothing illegal, I swear.”

“You sure about that?” Tony queries, taking some sort of mock observation of the room for contrabands. “What’s your name, kid?”

“Peter - uh, Parker. P-Peter Parker - look, I’m real sorry, sir --”

 _Sir_. Tony's always liked the sound of that, whether it be from quivering interns and lackeys to precious twinks, winking flirtatiously and buying him drinks at a bar. Glad to know Peter has a healthy respect for authority, Tony circles around the guy, taking in the strong line of his shoulders and the muscles of his back appreciatively. He tuts loudly, unashamedly drinking in the curvaceous swell of Peter’s ass straining against the dark denim of his skinny jeans. 

“Well if there’s one thing I know,” Tony declares, crowding against the younger mans back, hands snaking down to grip the younger man's hips. “It’s that you, Mr Parker, are definitely guilty.”

“Of _what_?”

Tony slides his hands dangerously close to his groin, fingernails scraping against the grain of the denim, noting that he smells like apple shampoo and sweat.

His fingers ghost over his crotch as he leans in to whisper in Peters ear.

“Possession of a dangerous weapon.” 

The beat drops.

He spins Peter around, grinning at him when realisation dawns in his big, brown eyes. He stalks forward, crowding the birthday boy backwards until Peters knees hit a chair, his broad body stumbling into it, a house of cards caving inwards as he gapes up at Tony, tiara askew.

“Oh my god,” Peter whispers, shuffling back into the chair as Tony grips the collar of his and rips the shirt off his body, flinging it into the crowd of onlookers with a flamboyant twirl. A crowd of men cheer jauntily as they tussle over it. 

Peter’s hands hand uselessly at his sides like forgotten limbs when Tony seats himself upon Peter’s lap. He grins at the dumbstruck man, brushing his knuckles along the crest of his cheekbones teasingly, his other hand gripping the back of the chair as his hips swivel, grinding down to the beat. 

He can tell the younger man is a little shy though, needs a little encouragement to engage in the act, so he noses along the path his knuckles went, leaning in to Peter’s ear. He can tell when his beard tickled his skin, when Peter shivers beneath him, his breath a stunted huff against Tony’s cheek.

“You can touch me you know,” Tony whispers, pressing a kiss to the man's earlobe. “It’s okay, everywhere above the belt I’m all yours. C’mon, kid, I want you to.”

Peter nods almost imperceptibly as the music switches to something more upbeat and when Tony feels Peter spread his legs beneath him he knows he’s on board.

The skittish, unsure touches, skimming across his skin feel nice. Peter’s hands nervously skate up from his hips, tracing the ridges of his abdominals, the line between his pectorals. Tony nods encouragingly as Peter grows more courageous, biting his bottom lip as he gains his confidence, eyes focused as his thin, long fingers explore Tony’s body.

Tony makes a pleased sound when those fingers find his nipples, even if they just brush over them. It’s enough to bring pink to Peter’s cheeks, enough to elicit more touches, enough that when Tony grips Peter’s hands and brings them to his ass, Peter _squeezes_ , even as he pants nervously in Tony’s ear.

“Oh my god, was that --” Peter stutters, rolling his hips anyway, body contradicting his reservations.

“You’re doing good,” Tony assures. “You doing okay? You gonna make it to the end?”

The moment Peter’s will resolves is visibly remarkable, a bold, wilful thing that grants steel to his big, brown eyes. The fingers still clutching Tony’s ass tightens squeezing his cheeks, his jaw sets, an overconfident nod to make sure Tony knows he’s willing and ready. Tony smiles carefully, mentally making notes to check in on the kid as the night progresses. Charming as Peter's confidence may be, Tony prides himself on giving a good time, no matter how anxious or rambunctious his client is.

“Buckle up, sweetheart," Tony says lowly, voice loud enough to be heard just between them under the speakers. "You're okay, I’m gonna make you feel good.”

Tony doesn’t know if the bulge he leaves in Peter’s jeans at the end of the number actually feels good - but with the bruises around his hips and the phantom sensation of Peter’s beautiful eyes following him, Tony certainly feels like a million dollars.

“Time’s up, beautiful,” Tony says, half an hour later when the music cuts. 

He rises up above Peter, tugging teasingly at the bright green feather boa that was draped around his neck some time throughout the piece. 

As he leaves Peter grips his hand tightly, unrelenting. Tony’s tugs once, about to call for security he doesn’t have, when Peter raises the back of his hand to his bitten lips, kissing it, and says, “Thank you for the dance. I - you’re amazing.”

Tony’s features soften at this, squeezing Peter’s hand back before he releases it. “Anytime,” he says. One look at Peter says he means it.

The wad of cash he collects after doesn’t feel nearly as nice as Peter’s hand in his.

\-----

The crisp midnight air feels heavenly against Tony’s overheated skin when he steps outside for a smoke. The bitter tang of nicotine helps to clear his head, the bass from within the house in perfect tandem with his over-excited heartbeat.

The routine went perfectly, he couldn’t have asked for a better client. If Tony closes his eyes he can still feel the phantom graze of Peter’s nervous fingers, the warmth of his fingertips and the calluses on his palms. There was dirt under his fingernails.

Times really do change, Tony considers, sweeping his gaze skyward in search of the half-crescent moon playing peek-a-boo between the clouds. To think that at Peter’s age Tony was already married and had the rest of his life planned out. 

Really, Tony had just a kid back then, all young wonderment and eyes on a horizon he always thought he could reach out and touch it. He wishes he could go back and tell his younger self that the horizon distorts so it can never be met, how the chase changes you. He doesn’t regret the pursuits or the years he spent with his ex-wife. Looking back, Tony can’t even regret the naïveté he had in thinking it was going to be forever, that she loved him as much as he loved her.

Tony didn’t know what to look for, he knows that now. Deceit in love wasn’t a language that he had ever heard or spoken, didn’t know the signs of danger in words he’d never known. 

The kid that he’d danced for stumbles out the front door, a quick burst of body-shaking bass bleeding out the gap before the door closes shut. The kid - Peter - looks flushed, limbs askew as he regains his balance, hairline damp and curling with sweat. 

He spots Tony, eyes widening at the same time his chest gives a slight hitch, frozen on the spot for just a moment before his body cooperates. 

Tony gives a sardonic wave. 

Peter seems to have a sense of humour, grinning wryly at the post-midnight company and shuffles forward to rest against the wooden porch railing, mirroring Tony’s relaxed posture. 

He soundlessly offers Peter a drag of his cigarette which he accepts gratefully, pursing his lips around the filter and exhaling smoke into the inky night sky. The cigarette looks good nestled between his rosy fingertips, as does the taste of the filter when he passes it back to Tony who doesn't hesitate to deeply inhale upon return. 

“Happy birthday, kid,” Tony yawns, scratching his scruff. 

“Thanks,” Peter smiles brightly, peering at his watch, “I mean, it’s not my birthday anymore, but thanks. And thanks for - y’know.”

“So what’s on the agenda now that you’re a real adult? Gonna raid a liquor store or something?”

Peter shrugs, accepting the cigarette when Tony passes it back to him. “Seems kind of arbitrary, doesn’t it?”

“Hmm?”

“I mean, I can drive, vote, join the army, but now I legally acquire Bud Light? Wow. Doesn’t really seem as a big a deal as it’s made out to be.”

Tony smiles wryly, peering over to see the younger mans face is smooth and carefree, accepting the cigarette back when it’s passed over. There’s nothing much left to it after Tony flicks the excess ash off the end, taking one last deep inhale before putting the stub out against the railing. 

Peter seems to linger even after he’s caught his breath and they’ve run out of small talk to share. 

“Not enjoying the party?” Tony surmises, turning around to observe the house, nodding politely to intoxicated passersby who yell belated birthday wishes to Peter.

The younger man shrugs, carding his fingers through his hair. When he turns he bumps his shoulder against Tony’s, the ghost of warmth against his skin. Peter assesses the house, the music, the distant yelling before offering Tony a wry smile. “Nah, it’s not really my scene. Harry’s a good friend but I’m more of a pizza and Star Wars kinda guy, y’know?”

“Do I take that to mean you didn’t enjoy the show?” Tony drawls, nudging Peter’s hip, waits for Peter to initiate further contact. “Should I be offended? C’mon, let it out, I’m open to constructive criticism.”

Peter balks, backtracking in a series of stutters, eyes turning imploringly to Tony in the same contrite way as when he’d first met him. “N-no, that’s not what I meant at all - your performance was _really_ good - like too good, I don’t even know how you get your hips to move like that --”

Tony can’t help but tease, mirthfully observing how Peters gaze drop to Tony’s lips, back up to his eyes and then back down again, all the while his fists nervously twist the material of his shirt, stretching the hem. Seriously, this guy is _adorable_. 

“C’mon,” Tony presses, biting his lip and watching how Peter's eyes darken. “What do I have to do to compete with your dream birthday plans - dress up as Leia in the slave costume?”

“Oh my god,” Peter whispers, throwing his head back to give a bark of laughter. 

“Scantily clad in a bikini and chains, think that could work for you?”

“Stop,” he snorts, pushing his warm hand against Tony’s shoulder in a light shove.

“Maybe Jabba The Hutt is more your thing?”

“Actually, I’m more of the wookie persuasion. Something about all that fur, y’know?”

Tony’s head whips to the side so fast he nearly snaps his neck. It’s only when Peter's face crumples from his helpless laughter that Tony realises that he’s not actually being serious and his snorts join the younger mans hitching shoulders, their giggles dwindling into soft smiles. 

“You’re a really good dancer, Mr…?”

“Just Tony is fine,” he waves him off. “None of that mister stuff, seriously. You'll hurt my feelings. We probably should have been on first-named basis before I gave you a lap dance and had you pinch my nipples, but better late than never, right?”

Peter chokes on his spit. “Yeah, um. Thank you for that, by the way. Did I mention you’re _really_ good at that, like, I’m pretty sure I’m harder than I’ve ever been in my entire life, so.”

“Still?” Tony asks, shamelessly leering at Peters crotch which, yep, there is an obscene bulge from tenting from his jeans. Tony could laugh it off as a pocketed flashlight but the protrusion twitches when Peter catches Tony staring. The younger man has the decency to act bashful, running a hand through his hair and blushing against the yellow outdoor lights. 

“Well, yeah. I mean you try having the most beautiful guy you’ve ever seen sit on your lap for nearly an hour. Dude, I think I’m chafing.”

Tony laughs, the genuine flattery settling into his skin and nesting in his chest. “Beautiful, huh?” Tony queries, turning in towards the younger man and tilting his head to the side, considering the other man, how he drifts to Tonys side almost unconsciously. 

“Well, yeah,” Peter shrugs, going for nonchalant but falling short. His eyes flicker between Tony and the ground, fingers drumming across the railing too quick not to contradict his nervousness. “I’m not trying to be gross, just being honest. You must hear that all the time though.”

“Beautiful isn’t exactly the word people go for,” Tony shakes his head, reaching forward to brush his knuckles against Peters cheek like he did during the dance. It’s mostly words that begin with the letter ‘S’. Some nice words starting with that letter, some unsolicited and not so nice. 

Peters breath is warm when he turns his face into Tony’s palm, breathing against the skin and gently nosing it, lips ghosting over it. “That’s dumb. I mean, like, you’re super gorgeous, dude.”

The warmth that blooms over Tony’s cheeks hasn’t appeared for a long, long time. He ducks his head, feeling Peters eyes on him as he wills the flush away.

“You’re not too bad on the eyes yourself,” Tony clears his throat, thumbing along Peters cheekbone. “Young though.”

“Not that young,” Peter whispers, close enough that Tony can smell the nicotine on his breath. “You said it, I’m a real adult now.”

“I’m at least twice your age,” Tony counters, even if he feels his will slipping away. He just wants to give in to someone who wants him too, just this once.

Peter looks crestfallen for just a second but hides it well, smiling fondly. He’s tall, Tony notices, his curls giving him an extra inch or so. They’re close enough that Tony can count his eyelashes. “I’m into older men.”

“Yeah? You had some experience with men my age?”

“Some.”

Tony huffs. “Your best friend paid me to take my clothes off for your birthday.”

Peter hums, catching Tony's hand in his and squeezing. When he lets go, Tony's hand falling gracelessly to his side, he can't help but stare at this ridiculous man, halo of chestnut curls highlighted by the fairy lights and stars, his tiara lost somewhere on the journey. Something inside his gut contracts painfully, erring on the side of pleasure, to the point where Tony wants to dive in and see how long he can hold his breath.

“It’s not my birthday anymore," Peter says, eyes drifting to Tony's mouth. "And I don’t want to pay you anything.”

“What do you want to do then?” Tony asks, stepping closer. He grips Peter's elbow and tugs very lightly until they are face to face and Tony can feel the exhalations from Peter's nose.

Instead of answering, Peter leans in to press a soft kiss to Tony’s scruff. When he recedes back a few inches, a hint of a smile lines his lips, taken from Tony’s skin. Something about his eyes glitter, soft and sad and endearingly hopeful. Like the kid knows the value and ache of a good risk.

“That. Maybe more. You could show me how to dance like that?” 

If Tony were a good man he would walk away, take one last look at the young man, pretty and prepossessing and immortalise it in his brain for times when he needs to recall on his integrity. 

But he’s done with trying to fit to his old interpretation of a good man. It’s a bad idea of the highest degree, but who could say no to that adorable pout? The skin under his beard tingles and he feels a flurry in his stomach, dipping like it’s in freefall like the first time he --

“How badly do you not want to go back to that party?”

\-----

Peter lounges like a cat in the passenger seat of Tonys car, line of his neck long as his head rests on the seat. His hand is warm in Tonys where their fingers are intertwined over the gear stick and the furtive, glances they send to one another at each set of traffic lights makes Tony feel lighter, foolish in a safe, measured way, in that Peter Pan, lost boy way, instead of the fear of a ticking clock. Peter looks ethereal in the passing street lights, fluorescents catching the brown of his eyes, lighting them up from within like a visible aura.

“Do you live far?” Peter asked, tilting his head to turn a questioning stare at Tony. His legs are spread askew, back curled against the stained carseats, long legs arranged into the passenger cabin.

Tony shakes his head, not wondering for the first time where this is going to lead.

“Do you always get into cars with strange men?” Tony asks instead, rubbing his thumb over the back of Peter’s hand, radio playing softly in the background from his tired old speakers, noise distorting when the bass increases.

“Do you always take young guys home with you?”

“Not since my freshman year of college,” Tony admits, grinning wryly at Peter’s questioning look. “I was married for twenty years,” he adds.

“Yeah?” Peter asks, smiling crookedly, unfazed.

“Yeah. That a turn off or something?”

“Does it _feel_ like a turn off?” Peter quips, using their linked fingers to bring Tony’s hand to his crotch, still hard and hot under the denim. The size the younger man is packing makes his mouth go dry and, finding his fingers rubbing at the bulge before he realises what he’s doing. 

“Besides,” Peter adds, groaning quietly, rolling his groin into Tony’s palm. “I think we’re past being strangers, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know, are we?”

With a mischievous streak on his face Peter shuffles closer until his side is pressed against the centre console. Gripping Tony’s outstretched arm for support he leans over to mouth at Tony’s neck. It sends shivers down his spine as hot, wet suction is applied where the skin is sensitive, teeth grazing against the side of his throat. Peter’s curls tickle the side of his face and its all Tony can do to keep his eyes forward and keep driving.

“I’m Peter Parker, twenty-one,” he murmurs, punctuating each fact with a searing kiss to Tony’s skin. “I study biochemical engineering at college and _I_ think you’re incredibly beautiful.” 

“I’m trying not to do anything stupid,” Tony warns, but reaches up to card his fingers through Peters curls with his free hand anyhow. The impression of Peter’s satisfied, caught-the-canary grin against his skin gives him butterflies.

“You should,” Peter rebuts, lips moving against Tony’s throat. “I’m very, very stupid.”

“I meant whilst driving, smartass.”

“Then don’t do anything, just let me do all the work.”

Peters tongue licking up a line of sweat on Tony’s neck is not how envisioned the night going, he didn’t have the foresight to conjure up the feeling of Peter’s big hands, his callused fingertips as they cup Tony’s jaw to keep him in place, the wet glide of his lips as they suck on Tony’s neck. He tries, desperately, to ignore the part of him that knows this is the most alight and alive he’s felt sober since he hit a personal best, that this sounds like a bad idea but feels like perfect completion.

Instead he gets lost in the attention Peter laves on him, the simultaneous satisfied noises emerging helplessly from the both of them, tries not to feel like a king on a throne with the soft kisses Peter presses against his jaw in time with the hand palming at his cock through his jeans, so hard it’s exquisitely painful. 

Body on fire, it’s the first time in a long time that Tony feels like he’s ascending.

All too soon he’s pulling into the drive-way before his house, putting his car into park and turning off the headlights. 

The car is still idling when Tony whispers, “Okay, okay, wait,” and tugs Peter by the hair into a kiss, lips meeting for the first time that night. The tongue that quickly plunders his mouth is wet and slick against his own and he savours the small, warm puffs of air from Peters’ nose when he groans in satisfaction, the sound of their seatbelts unbuckling a perfect punctuation when the centre console becomes a troublesome barrier.

“Inside,” Tony suggests between their lips, clutching Peter’s shirt at the collar. “C’mon.”

Tony leads Peter by the hand, fumbling with his keys at the door when the younger man noses at the back of his neck, warm breath rippling a shudder out of him. Once inside he nearly stumbles over a box he’d set by the door filled with some of the last spite items he’d held onto; jewellery boxes, photos, useless knick-knacks he’d swiped from the rupture of their marriage.

“Sorry,” Tony mumbles, weaving around the junk littering his floor. “I wasn’t expecting a guest, so. Ta-dah, this is my humble abode.”

“It’s nice,” Peter comments politely, stepping over the box and through the piles of books and records Tony had bought and had yet to sort, a collection of items meant to show that he was getting his life back together. He was getting there, slowly.

Peter follows him into the kitchen where Tony offers him a large glass of water, accepting it with a quiet thanks; and the way his throat bobs when he swallows shouldn’t be as endearing as Tony finds it, he thinks, rubbing himself through his jeans. 

The younger man notices the action, setting the glass down on the bench, stepping into Tonys’ space and crowding him against the counter, a coy smile on his young face. 

As if sensing Tony’s apprehension he rubs his hands up and down Tony’s arms comfortingly, taking both hands in his, feathering light kisses on both of them, the depth of his big brown eyes when he looks at Tony somehow making his insides feel lighter.

 _Jesus, who is this kid_ , Tony thinks, disentangling their hands so he can wrap his arms around the man's waist, lithe body melting into him, noses sliding together, mouths barely apart, breath on lips. The closer Tony gets the more he can smell beer and sweat and cologne, but Peter's eyes are clear, as sober as they come. It helps waft away some of the lingering doubt. 

“So,” Tony begins, brushing a kiss to the corner of Peters mouth, vertebrae lighting up like street lights as the younger mans shivers with the motion. “this is what I think we should do.”

“Mhmm,” Peter hums, clutching tightly to Tonys shoulders.

“We put on the pizza I have in my freezer, in honour of your birthday, take out a couple beers and then...”

“Mhmm?”

“And then while that’s cooking,” Tony whispers, kissing the other side of his mouth, “you sit back and let me blow you. What do you think, darling? Do we have a winner?”

Peter nods, visibly gulping. “I think that’s a good plan. Solid.”

 _Solid indeed_ , Tony thinks not five minutes later with Peter’s cock down his throat.

It’s definitely solid, a warm and firm press on his tongue, coarse pubic hair tickling Tony’s nose as he takes the generous appendage to the root. His scalp stings where Peter has been pulling his hair, garbled words of praise spilling from his mouth as he leaks between Tony’s lips, pre-come dripping onto Tony's tongue, coating the roof of his mouth. 

“So fucking good, Tony, _oh my god_ , like that - “

He pulls off for a moment, appreciatively drinking in the heave of Peters chest, the dampened patches of his shirt where he has begun to sweat, the cloudiness of his eyes where his vision has glazed over in pleasure.

“I just want it known that I don’t normally do this,” Tony says, jacking the length with his hand, the edge of his hot-red coffee table digging into his back. “Fuck clients, I mean.”

“Not your client,” the younger man reminds him, gently tracing the shell of Tony’s ear. “Just some guy you met at a party.”

“Most of the guys I’ve meet at parties don’t get any further than the bathroom,” Tony admits, instantly getting that freefall feeling again, cart straight of the rollercoaster, as the weight of what he’s just said turns him asunder. His stomach flips, waiting for the laughter.

He thinks Peter knows anyway, if the fond smile on his face is of any indication. He isn't entertained, but he's still here. Still fervently adoring when he traces the outline of Tony's ear, tugs at the lobe gently when Tony takes the length back in his throat, humming when the head hits the base of his throat. Provided such patience, Tony can't help but give it his all, jacking what length his mouth fails to reach, looking up at Peter every time his breath hitches.

“Wait,” Peter groans moments later, breath hitching as he withdraws his hips further into the sofa. “Wait, wait. I don’t wanna --”

Tony pulls off again quickly, sliding his hands down Peters thighs to rest on his knees and squeezing reassuringly as the younger man tries to catch his breath, ankles knocking against Tony’s hips in barely restrained abandon. 

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” Peter affirms, hunching forward slightly, hooking his hand under Tony’s arms to encourage him upwards into a searing kiss. “Just, not yet. Let me take you to bed.”

“Yeah, okay,” Tony says agreeably, instantly on his feet and dragging Peter into a stand. He has to unzip his jeans to relieve some of the pressure as Peter kicks off his pants and briefs that had been pooled at his feet, precome leaking down his shaft.

They fall into Tony’s bed like a stack of cards crumpling inwards, stumbling through his bedroom door, hands intertwined, lips on lips, sheets a welcome embrace to their tangled legs, the weight of Peter pressing down on him, all hot kisses and exploratory hands. It’s those same hands that strip Tony of the rest of his clothing, that stroke reverently down his torso, carding through this chest hair, thumbing over the grooves of his abdominals until they reach the thatch of pubic hair above his groin. 

The open admiration in Peter’s face is for a hot second too much, flaring up in Tony’s heart like something worth keeping so Tony puts his arm over his eyes, loses himself in the sensations of Peter gently ridding him of his clothing, the warm imprint of kisses down his sternum, knees spreading to unfurl his opening. 

The warm air of the room feels good against his bare cock, against his hole where Peter’s thumbs stroke him softly. 

It takes both a moment and a lifetime for Peter to locate the lube and breach him with a single finger and ask, “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?

Tony’s not sure of the exact question. How long since he had someone else in his body, or how long it’s been since he’d had unadulterated, remorseless bliss- or had someone take care of him like this? - nonetheless he agrees, because it’s both true, humming as the stretch becomes familiar with each added finger.

“This okay?” Peter checks in, pressing a sweet kiss to Tony’s mouth as his fingers scissor inside him.

“Yeah,” Tony hums, arching his back a little as Peter nears that sweet spot inside him, savouring the stretch of knuckles protracting out of his rim. “S’good, just higher -”

“Like that?” Peter queries, shifting the angle of his wrist so that his fingertips graze the part of his body that makes his insides light up. “There?”

“Yes, there - _fuck_ ,” Tony gasps on a laugh, hooking his leg around Peter to keep him in place. “Where did you - your fingers, _fucking god -_ -”

His neck tilts back as starbursts crowd his vision, toes curling against Peters bare shin as his body lights up from within, god he’s _so close_ already. But Peter just uses the opportunity to latch onto his neck again, fixated on marking up the skin with his teeth, trailing his kisses downwards until the tight nub of one of his nipples is caught between those same teeth.

“C’mon, I’m not getting any younger,” Tony groans, tugging at Peters hair, toes already curling with how on edge he is. 

“So bossy,” Peter pouts when he pulls off Tony’s chest, swiftly pecking his lips. “You sure you’re ready?”

“If you don’t get your dick inside me I’m going to finish without you,” Tony warms, snaking a hand down to squeeze the base of his own dick to help stave off his orgasm, willing himself to think of gross thoughts like the smell of Steve’s socks after a workout. 

“Okay, okay,” Peter laughs quietly, ripping open the packet left on the bedside table and rolling the condom down his cock. “You’re alright, I got you."

Spreading his legs further, Tony uses the moment to peer down between their bodies, watches how the younger mans toned stomach twitches as he withdraws his fingers from Tony, petting his perineum soothingly before using the leftover lube on his fingers to jack his own cock, how sweat is already beading on Peter’s upper lip and the return of the high flush on his cheeks, how it blooms all the way down to his neck. 

Tony wants to be everywhere at once, taking Peter’s upper lip between his to taste the salt, marking up his neck with his beard, inside him and around him all at the same time. When Peter finally pushes inside him some of that ache eases, the stretch stinging a little as he breaches inside Tony inch by inch until he is fully immersed within him. Peter groans, jaw twitching in profound pleasure as he begins to thrust lightly. 

Nosing his way upwards, Peter leans forward to curl over Tony, cradling his head with his forearms.

The angle does something to Tony that hasn’t been done to him in a long time. Without warning he cries out suddenly, back arching off the bed as his prostate is grazed relentlessly by the head of Peter’s cock. 

“Oh, holy shit - fuck, right there --”

Peter grins and without saying a word the challenge is accepted.

\-----

After, Tony lights a cigarette in bed as the sweat cools and tries to not find the way Peter traces his naked skin endearing. Tony’s own free hand strokes slowly down the pale terrain of the man's naked back, both spent and sated and warm, curled into each other to seek the heartbeat in the skin that had been missing from all lovers before.

Peter purses his soft lips around the filter when Tony offers him a drag of the cigarette, exhaling towards the ceiling as Tony winds open the window behind them. When he takes the cigarette back to his own mouth Peter busies himself in pressing kisses down Tony’s side, grazing one of his still sensitive scars. 

Despite all of his best efforts Tony tries not to flinch, but Peters lips tilt into a frown.

“Sorry,” Peter whispers. “Did I hurt you?”

“Nah,” Tony dismisses, stretching over to the bedside table to flick cigarette ashes into a coke can. “Just sensitive.” 

“What happened?” Peter asks. Blinking, he hurries to add, “I mean, you don’t have to tell me. Or you can if you want. Or not. We can pretend I didn’t say anything, shutting up now - I just - sorry, that was kinda invasive.”

Tony settles back down on the bed and draws Peter closer, closing his eyes as he buries his nose in his curls and pressing a kiss into his hair. “It’s okay, there’s not much to say exactly. Something bad happened a few years back.”

“Mmm?”

“I got hurt and I survived and now I’m okay. S’all there is.”

“A story for the ages,” Peter huffs on a laugh, furrowing closer into Tony’s neck but doesn’t pry any further. 

“You got any scars, kid?” Tony asks, lifting the sheet to peer down at the expanse of smooth skin for something he might have missed before, leering shamelessly at the firm swell of Peter’s ass.

“A few,” Peter says into his chest, dozing off moments later. The night is late and Tony is exhausted but he still feels the puff of Peters exhales against his chest as his consciousness fades to black.

In the morning they have toast and scrambled eggs for breakfast with their feet up on the red coffee table and drink Tony’s cheap, granulated instant coffee. Peter coos to his basil plant as he insists upon washing the dishes - _like a good guest_ , he says - and gushes over Tony’s blueprints left sprawled all over his kitchen and coffee tables, picking them up and dissecting the building designs as if they were artworks.

Peter asks if he can see Tony again, kissing him sweetly at the door.

Tony says yes.

\-----

On Tuesday he signs gets tender for a client worth a quarter of a million per annum. 

It’s an old contact from his old life, a CEO who doesn’t like the current operations of his old company and Tony is only too pleased to sign, taking on an exorbitant amount of work with his limited resources - but Tony himself is anything but limited, so he foregoes predictions and and tells the universe he’s okay with making it rain again.

He celebrates first by having a poker night with Rhodes, Buck and Steve - then Natasha, his new business partner, a never ending trove of beer and vodka over his newly cleaned dining room and stacks of pizza boxes, garlic bread foil wrappings and sickly sweet cola bottles.

Tony celebrates next by accepting Peters offer to see each other again, meeting up with him for coffee in a perfectly respectable establishment during daylight hours. 

They meet, shy, all chest-to-chest hugs and chaste kisses in one of those nondescript, new-age cafes that allow book rentals and play soft jazz music to the accompanying slurp of their overpriced not-for-profit-but-kinda-for-profit coffee. It tastes okay, but the taste of Peter's skin when Tony kisses his knuckles in greeting, then his lips in departure, is much better.

Peter doesn’t invite him in after the second date when Tony drives him home, but he does kiss him silly and bruise his lips and neck to all hell so he thinks maybe Peter is taking it slow.

It’s a bad idea. 

Tony knows. He can already hear the disbelieving, disparaging commentary from his friends before he even thinks about bringing it up. Especially when Peter never said he wanted anything more than casual. It seems maybe it’s only Tony wants more but he doesn’t dare burst the bubble - and who is he to blame Peter if that is what he wants? He’s twenty-one and about to start his grad year. That doesn’t scream of settling down.

Tony’s not sure where that leaves him exactly, but he’s trying the whole play it by ear thing. 

Nonetheless, it’s a revelation at forty-four to realise that Tony was no longer built for casual sex.

Maybe his twenty-something self was, but those years were given to someone else in sickness and health - and he’s come far enough to say that he doesn’t regret giving those years to her - those early years at least, when all they had was each other and that tiny one bedroom, it was still real and meaningful then. He wouldn’t be the person he is now without those years. 

Even when he slept around during the post-divorce meltdown it was less about self-affirmation. It was systemic self-destruction. Even now, Tony’s not one hundred percent sure that he’s completely past that yet, but the muds not on his knees.

Natasha turns out to be a godsend. 

She’s smart, effective, witty as a whiplash and the little sister Tony never had. Or wanted. They get along like a house on fire. She turns her nose up at all of Tony’s bad habits but doesn’t judge him for it. Tony catches her once drinking vodka at ten in the morning on a Wednesday. She says she’s just Russian, it’s practically coffee, but Tony’s also heard the arguments between her and her off-again-on-again. She’s got her own demons too and it makes her one of the realest people in his life.

She asks him at one point if he’s single and Tony is truthful when he answers and says he doesn’t know. 

On their third get-together-not-date Peter takes Tony to the drive-in the next town over. 

Stomach in knots, Tony takes a hot second to wonder exactly what the actual, veritable fuck he thinks he’s doing playing cute with some college kid, belly churning like he’s fourteen and nervous about brushing pinkies. Even in high school he’d never gone to a drive-in. 

It’s playing A Nightmare on Elm Street. Tony’s seen it before, decades ago. In all of it's glory, nostalgic to him, retro to his guest, Tony watches with mild interest as the kids are terrorised in their dreams, micro-napping under the fluorescents, humming along to the perverse lullabies and snickering as the surrounding patrons gasp intermittently.

In the passenger seat, Peter seems focused on the screen, biting his lip at all of the scary moments, holding and squeezing Tony’s hand during the jump scares. But there is little pretence about the direction of his attention when he shifts closer, arm outstretched over the centre console, the heat of his hand burning through denim as it slides up Tony’s thigh. 

By the time Johnny Depp is swallowed into his bed Peter is straddling Tony’s lap in the back seat, jeans pushed to his knees and groaning loudly over the speakers as Tony fists his cock. Mouthing wetly at the column of Peter’s throat, Tony makes sure to give his sensitive neck all the attention it needs, hot and biting kisses all over, skin heating beneath his touch, knows how the prickle of his beard makes Peter shiver.

Peters head is thrown back in dazed pleasure, giving Tony access to the soft underside of his chin, muscles quivering as he exhales, feels the vibration of his breath hitching as he gets closer to release. Tony groans along with him as Peter grinds down where Tony is rock hard, has been rock hard since Peter palmed him the entire drive over. 

“You getting close, sweetheart?” Tony whispers, thumbing Peter’s cock over the slit, smearing precome over the head that looks red and swollen even in the dim lighting.

“Yeah,” Peter breathes, dipping his head to press a kiss to Tony’s lips. “Fuck, you’re so - _ahh,_ so good at that.”

“Yeah?” Tony prompts between kisses. “That how you like it?”

Peter squirms in his lap, trying to get more friction on his cock. “Yeah, just like that, don’t stop - ” he sighs, capturing Tony’s lips with his. 

The embrace grows more and more heated as Tony begins rolling his hips upwards, increasing the pace of his hand as it works Peter over, kisses turning into pleasured gasps. He breaks for breath, pressing their foreheads together, Peter’s curls falling into his face.

He’s about to go for broke when there is a knock at the window.

“Sirs?” Comes a voice from outside and another window knock. “Uh, _sirs_?” 

Both Peter and Tony turn their gaze at the same time to see a stern looking man in a yellow and blue uniform, his name tag says _Paul - Manager_. Paul's face looks positively thunderous as he makes a gesture for the windows to roll down. Tony stills for a moment as his mind goes blank.

“Shit,” Peter hisses, curling into Tony in an effort to cover up his naked lap.

Tony blinks and reaches the hand not currently wrapped around Peters cock to wind down the window. It’s an old car and gets stuck halfway.

“Sirs,” Paul crouches, speaking loudly into the gap. “We’ve received several complaints from other patrons about your, uh, conduct. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

“Uh, sure,” Tony croaks. “Our bad. Real sorry.”

With that he winds the window back up and waves the manager away. Once the coast is clear Peter crawls out of his lap and makes himself decent, lips pursed as he pulls his jeans over the still present erection.

Back on the road they’re silent, save for the radio and the whirr of the heater. 

On the highway going eighty, a moment passes until Peter’s eyes meet his - it’s then that they crack. 

Tears in his eyes, Tony laughs so hard he has to pull over.

\-----

“I cannot believe that happened,” Peter says for the third time, wiping tears from his eyes from renewed laughter as Tony pulls up to his building, some apartment complex on the outskirts of the campus. “That was not my plan for tonight, I swear.”

“ _Sirs_?” Tony repeats, in that same high pitch again that prompts Peter into breathy giggles. “Penises, in _my_ drive-in? This is highly unorthodox, I demand you put them back in their positions before I call the police, I _do_ declare.”

“You are the worst,” Peter snuffles, “don’t talk about your unorthodox penis that way.”

“My penis is very orthodox,” Tony disagrees, dimming the headlights. “My grandparents made very sure of that.”

“Oh my god,” Peter laughs, leaning across the console to smack their lips together. “I know we’re taking it slow, but do you wanna come up? We don’t hafta, _y’know_. But you’re talking about your penis, and I have tea.”

“What kind of tea,” Tony mumbles, pressing kisses to Peter’s jaw, inwardly alight at the invitation, heart doing something funny. “Aphrodisiac tea?”

“Green, I think,” Peter snorts. “Chamomile? I don’t know. My house-mate is on an organic kick.”

“Oh baby,” Tony drawls, “talk dirty to me. You know how earl grey gets me hot.”

Peter pulls back. “Do you want to come inside or not?”

“Do you want me to come inside?”

“Is that a sexual metaphor?” Peter shakes his head. “You know what, I don’t care, come inside. I’ll make you hot chocolate instead.”

Tony grins and lets himself be pulled into the building, locking his car and then locking his fingers with Peters as they enter the elevator, mashing the button for the sixth floor. It creaks on its upwards descent worryingly but Peter doesn’t seem phased. He leads Tony to an apartment towards the end of the hall, beckoning him inside and gesturing to the interior airily.

“Mi casa et tu casa, or something.” Peter says, waving towards the belly of the apartment. It’s small, from the living room Tony can see the kitchenette, the adjacent small dining area, and down the hall.

“It’s nice,” Tony says, following Peter into the kitchenette, watching as he moves around the limited space, fluid and familiar, placing the kettle on the stove and cranking on a flame. “Cosy.”

“It’s affordable,” Peter shrugs, scooping powdered hot chocolate into two mugs. He turns to lean back against the bench, widening his stance and beckoning Tony closer with his hand.

He goes willingly. Of course he does. Tony’s only known Peter for a few short weeks but somehow the cradle of his arms has become a safehouse, the way Peter envelops him makes him feel like he’s not going to shake apart. Even if Tony were blind the sound of his voice is a comfort, he likes how sass and snark sound from Peter’s lips, how he combines sweet talk and sarcasm. 

Tony just...really likes _him_. 

It’s going to end in heartbreak. 

“You’re thinking,” Peter whispers, wrapping his arms around Tony’s shoulders when he steps in between the younger mans legs, gripping Peters waist as the kettle whistles beside them, thumbs stroking the curve of his hips beneath the denim.

“Thinking about you,” Tony says, pecking him once, twice.

“Only good thoughts I hope,” Peter says against his lips, exhaling from his nose so warm air tickles the bristles of Tony's facial hair.

“The best thoughts.”

“Yeah? Like what?”

“Like how sexy you are,” Tony sways them slightly, his own mouth helpless and meeting the upward curve of Peter's lips against the overhead light flickering. “How gorgeous you are. How strong and smart you are.”

“Why, Mr. Stark,” Peter says with a false, high southern accent, closing his eyes and breathing Tony in. “If I didn’t know any better I’d say you are trying to seduce me.”

Tony smiles like a shark and leans in. “That’s because I am.”

“The scandal,” Peter smiles, biting Tony's lip, proving to be the shark instead. “Whatever will the neighbours think?” 

He ends up staying the night.

\-----

The morning is kind of awkward.

Tony wakes up with a full bladder sometime during ass o’clock, Peter’s knee pressing against his tender stomach, snoring softly against Tony’s neck, morning wood pressed against Tony’s hip.

The room is pitch black and Tony has to try and swallow the panic firing gunshots in his extremities, that split second of not knowing where he is, thinking he’s still there. Gently extracting himself out of Peter’s bed he listens to the sound of traffic and Peter’s breathing as a guiding bell, stumbling across the room to open the curtain a fraction, just to see the street lamps, the neon sign of the deli across the street. 

With the cityscape in sight the gunfire in his body slowly ceases, wind whistling through the bullet holes, his everything a hollow echo chamber. Quiet as he can manage Tony sneaks out into the hallway, finding the bathroom at the end of the hall. Locking it, he pauses at the mirror and takes a moment to tell his perspiring, ashen reflection to get a fucking grip.

Once he relieves himself and washes hands Tony tiptoes back out. The chill of the tiles against his bare feet have him keen on burying himself back under the covers. 

Except, a bleary-eyed looking girl wearing boxers, a stained shirt and a wild mane of curls is out in the hallway with her arms crossed over her chest, a rigid frown on her face. 

“Uh, hi,” Tony says, mirroring her and crossing his arms over his chest. He’s not wearing anything except Peter’s briefs. They have dancing hamburgers on them. “I’m sorry if I woke you.”

“Who the fuck are you,” she croaks, knuckling the sleep from her eyes.

Tony stills, feeling simultaneously piqued and cowed by the rail thin girl. “Tony...who are you?”

Understanding washes over her face, the taut line of her shoulders going lax in recognition. “So _you’re_ Tony.” Her gaze scans him up and down, assessing. She has a faultless confidence about her, and Tony knows that she doesn't care what he thinks. Her lips purse at whatever she finds. “Not what I expected.”

“Cool,” Tony blinks. “Anyway,” he sidesteps her, reaching for the door handle. “Goodnight, nice meeting you, whoever you are.”

Inside, skin highlighted by the yellow glow of the city lights, Peter is sitting up in bed looking adorably sleepy, sheets rumpled in a heap at his lap, scrubbing at his face with his hand.

“Thought maybe you’d gone home,” Peter mumbles, yawning widely. 

The words give Tony pause. Shaking his head, he gestures to whatever lies beyond the bedroom door. “Just trying to get passed your gate-keeper. All she needs is a mace and she’s set.”

“Gate-keeper?"

“Surly, curly, and attitude for days?”

“Oh,” Peter says, yawning again. “MJ.”

“Sure,” Tony pauses, shifting on the spot. “Wait - do you want me to go home? I jumped the gun, a bad habit of mine, I know - I probably should have checked with you before I, y’know, passed out in your arms. Sorry about that.”

Peter looks at him strangely, shuffling forward so his knees drape over the edge of the bed, toes curling against the carpet. “Um, no? I mean, like, unless you want to go home?”

“I’d rather not at,” Tony checks his watch, “four twenty-seven in the morning.”

Peter pats the mattress next to him. “So stay. Stop being weird.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony scrubs his face with both hands, seating himself flush next to Peter on the bed. “I just...”

Winding an arm around the older man's waist, Peter presses his lips softly to Tony’s bare shoulder. It’s the encouraging squeeze to his hip that gives Tony the grit to give voice to his thoughts. Turning towards the younger man and taking one of his hands in his, Tony runs his fingers over Peter’s bumpy knuckles, memorises the texture of the sensitive webbing between his fingers as he collects his thinking. 

He really needs a fucking cigarette.

“When my wife left,” Tony started, swallowing the old shame that swells in his throat, “I was a mess, Pete, I mean - I’m _still_ a mess. I slept around a lot. Like, a lot lot. Like, you know. A _lot_.”

“Okay,” Peter nods, calmly watching as Tony manipulated his fingers to his will. He doesn’t appear to be too outwardly bothered by it. “Are you trying to say you have an STI?”

“What?” Tony balks. “ _No,_ Peter, what the _\--_ ”

“Sorry! Sorry. I just thought that’s where you were leading. My bad, please continue.”

“I guess what I’m trying to say is,” Tony says quietly, curling Peters fingers into his palm and releasing his hand, “I found that casual sex isn’t for me. I’m not looking for casual - I’m looking for a partner - and Pete, I really like you but you’re young, and I can see why you wouldn’t want to settle down.”

“Wait,” Peter blinks confusedly. “You thought this was casual sex for _me_? Oh my god, Tony Something Stark --”

“Baby -- “

Peter cuts him off. “I’ve been waiting for _weeks_ for you to tell me I’m too naive to want to settle down --”

“-- I didn’t use the word naive --”

“No, just young and uninformed,” Peter frowns, letting his arm drop from Tony’s waist, retreating in on himself. He looks smaller than Tony has ever seen him, this larger than life, impossible guy. “But I want that. I want that for us - I want there to _be_ an us. I don’t want casual sex with you or anyone else.”

Something inflates in his chest but he can't say anything, can't say _me too_ , or _I adore you_ , or _you make shit hot chocolate but I really like you so I'll drink it to make you happy_. It's that interminable drive to want to make the other happy that Tony fears most, now.

“You want to be with me. To settle for me. You don't even know my middle name.”

“To settle _with_ you. And so, tell me? You're uptight so it's probably something like Angus or Bartholomew."

"Edward, actually."

"See? Mine's Benjamin," the younger man nods, his face going serious. "Bet it's a relief for you to know my initials aren't pee-pee."

Tony smiles, shoulders hitching with silent laughter as Peter's serious expression melts away, his nose scrunching up as he snickers. It's the cutest fucking thing Tony has ever seen, the way his skin creases around his eyes, the way laughter makes his jaw set as if he's trying to rein it in. 

“So to be clear,” Tony iterates, once the laughter subsides, “ _Peter_ , you mean, like a relationship. As in, like, monogamy and matching sweaters and bad inside jokes.”

“We already have the bad inside jokes,” Peter huffs, the curve of his lips going soft soon after. “And yeah, I want that with you. I want that a lot. In a white picket-fence kinda way.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Peter shrugs, looking down at his hands and smiling ruefully. “I want to call you my boyfriend and meet your friends and y’know, do groceries on the weekend or whatever. I just didn’t know you wanted that from _me_.”

“To be fair, I’m not all that organised up here,” Tony said, gesturing around his forehead. “In fact, it’s a bit of a circus after all of the animals have escaped and trampled over the ring-leader. Fair warning. Also, I'm bad at groceries. I had string-cheese for lunch today.”

“S’okay, you have me now,” Peter says, resting his chin on Tony’s shoulder. “I can handle it. I like string-cheese. Got calcium for your old bones.”

Tony snorts, shoulders easing from the tension he didn't know he was holding. He isn't so sure about how well the statement of Peter's durability will hold up to a pressure test, but the dig of Peter's chin into the meaty part of his body anchors him, the sleep-warmed hands on his makes him want to dispel his doubts just this once.

“You wanna go back to bed?” Tony asks, chest aching as Peter yawns in the grey, lowlight of the morning. “Now that we’ve had our sappy and emotional Hallmark moment?”

“I’m pretty wired,” Peter admits, scrubbing his face. “But can we cuddle?”

Tony smiles, chest going soft behind his ribs. “Yeah, baby, I’d like that a lot.”

\-----

In the morning MJ finds them canoodling on the sofa, watching Johnny Bravo reruns and clutching matching mugs of chamomile. 

“Hey, MJ!” Peter waves at her. “This is Tony - he’s my _boyfriend_!”

“I don’t care,” she says, heading for the kitchen.

Peter beams.

\-----

The next month is spent in a whir of blueprints and business meetings, workouts and workdays and evenings with Peter and nights rolling around the sheets. 

A few weeks after their talk, Tony accepts another job at a bachelor party. He’s financially secure enough to not need to strip anymore. But he just wanted to see if it was still fun.

And while Tony was heaped with praise and made to feel good about himself and his body from Peter all the time, there was just something different about working a party. This is the job that gave him the confidence to begin with - he liked doing it so, for now, until he felt like going soft around the middle, he was doing it. 

But there was a rising apprehension that Peter might have misgivings about Tonys _other_ job, now that they were officially exclusively dating. Even if that was how they met. And it’s not like Tony can really fault him - not everyone likes to know their partner is getting paid to essentially dry hump a stranger on the regular. Tony hadn’t really thought it through before accepting, but it might be a deal breaker.

Tony voices his concern to Peter one night over egg rolls and Die Hard. 

Tapping his beer bottle with his fingernails for something to do with his hands, he tries to figure out the best way of articulating his feelings.

Before bringing it up Tony had rehearsed it in his mind. _I’m gonna strip for some guy, that cool?_ Or, _I want to continue stripping, I’m a narcissist, sorry if you can’t accept that._

It all sounded a little callous, even to his own ears so he’d consulted Google: _how to speak to your partner about compromise._ In the end he’d come up with this:

“They’re going to touch me. Y’know, within reason, nothing crazy,” Tony said. “They’re going to see my body. If that’s not something you think you can handle, you need to let me know now.”

The younger man didn’t immediately peace out, which wasn’t all that reassuring to be honest. Peter was silent for a minute, swallowing roughly. Tony held off on the relief he wanted to feel, watching the other man quietley deliberate, thinking nervously Peter might lay out some restrictive ‘ground rules’, stipulations, so to speak. Rules Tony probably wouldn't like a part of.

Instead, Peter had flushed and said, “Can I watch?”

“You want to _watch_?" Tony has responded, dubious. "Just watch? You can’t participate or try to put a stop to it if you don’t like it.”

“Trust me, that’s not going to be a problem. So, can I?”

Tony agreed.

Any ideas that Tony might have had about Peter playing bodyguard or being destructively jealous were wrong. Like, really wrong.

It made the whole thing incredibly sensual if he was honest. All throughout the performance Tony could feel Peter’s eyes on him, interested gaze burning heat into his skin. When he met Peter’s eyes as he straddled the lap of the bachelor it felt like exquisite, mutual foreplay. From the back of the room Tony could see Peter palm himself amongst the cheering and wolf-whistling, hand grazing over the bulge in his jeans. 

It felt like he wasn’t just dancing for himself anymore. He liked that.

Peter blew him on the car ride home. He said Tony was _amazing._

“Everyone wanted you,” Peter pants, pulling off Tony’s cock to speak, lips red and swollen. “You looked so fucking _sexy_ , Tony, they were all looking at you. I can’t believe you’re coming home with _me_.”

“I only saw you,” Tony groaned, one hand on the steering wheel, the other fisting Peter’s hair as he bobs up and down on Tony’s cock, humming affirmatively around him. “Just you, baby.”

Later that night he’d rode Peter in his brand new bed, the one he had picked out the weekend before. It’s all treated industrial steel and looks like it belongs in a warehouse. It’s miles apart from the imported four-poster of his marriage bed - and Peter loves it, his long fingers curled around the steel beams of the headboard as Tony bounced on his cock, bracing his hands on Peter's chest and pinning him to the bed.

Peter stays the night and makes him breakfast in bed - burnt toast and soggy scrambled eggs. 

Tony’s never been so fucking happy.

\-----

That’s the problem.

\-----

After Peter leaves for class the next morning Tony looks at all of the new facets of his life. He wonders exactly how the fuck he’s going to bring them all together and when they’re all going to start falling apart.

Before, when it all was glossy perfection, no creases to be seen, Tony was content. Now, he’s walking around corners on high alert, wondering when it’s all going to start tumbling down.

It keeps him up.

\-----

“Have I done something wrong?” Peter asks the following weekend when they’re out to dinner.

“Wrong? No, why would you think that?” Tony queries, twisting his spaghetti idly.

Peter clears his throat and looks around the room. “Maybe because you’ve barely spoken to me all night and won’t look me in the eye.”

Tony puts his fork down and forces himself to do what he’s been avoiding all evening. He faces Peter and wonders. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m just very tired."

“Tired,” Peter repeats. “Like bed tired, or skipping stones off the abandoned lake tired.”

“The first one,” Tony lies, sure that it’s both.

Peter looks dubious, his own fork scraping against the porcelain as he idly threads fettuccine through it “You sure?”

No, Tony thinks. He doesn’t want to be here. But he doesn’t want Peter to leave, either. _What do you want from me?_ He wants to say. _Tell me how I’m going to fit you in where you shouldn’t want to be fitted. How much should I spend on the pipe dream of everything being okay?_

“Yeah, I’m sorry. It’s just me being an old fart, you know how it is.”

It’s enough to break a wry smile onto Peters face. “You’re not old, Tony. You’re just burned out.”

Tony huffs, squeezing Peter’s hand.

“Yeah, that too.”

\-----

“You any good at interior decorating?”

“Not really.”

“Excellent.”

\-----

“What the fuck is _that_ ,” Rhodey asks, aghast.

On the other side of his extended finger is one of the new frames adorning Tony’s living room wall. Almost certain of which he’s referring to Tony lifts his head from the armrest to look over, smiling lazily at the sight. And what a sight it was - an oil painting of a French bulldog wearing a frilled and a feather hat, looking every bit a Fifteenth Century English monarch.

“I call him Sir Henry Reinbach III,” Tony says around the cigarette dangling between his lips. “He’s very distinguished.”

“Right,” his friend stares at him as if he grew another head, eagle-eyes roaming over the room and all of the sudden new changes since his last visit. He blinks, visibly blanching before gesturing confusedly to the six-inch statue of the waltzing pigs on his coffee table. They’re wearing tuxedos. “And _that_?”

“Oh, it’s cute, right?”

“...Are you taking drugs?”

“What? No, c’mon you grumpy asshole. It’s _quirky_.”

Tony watches Rhodeys bewildered gaze go from the painting, to the statue, then to the gaudy hot-pink ramekin that’s now doubling as Tony’s ashtray. The disbelief and distaste exuding from his friend is near palpable. That's how Tony knows he did a good job. “Where did you even find this stuff?”

“Me and Peter went thrift-shopping on Saturday,” Tony says, unmuting the baseball when it returns from commercial. “Helped me get rid of some of the old crap.” It’s the top of the eighth and the Mets are beating the Braves. 

Peter loves the Mets. It’s one of his very few flaws.

“And you decided eccentric disaster was more your taste.”

“I mean yeah,” Tony shrugs. “Is that not me? If it made us laugh, we just said fuck it and grabbed it. Peter liked the pigs, though - and y’gotta admit, honeybear, Sir Henry is way better than what was there before.”

Rhodey blinks, throwing back the last of his Bud Light. “And when am I going to meet Peter?”

“When I feel like you’re not going to judge me for my life choices.”

“So, literally never then.”

“Maybe your narrowed framing of my life choices is the reason why more aren’t shared with you.”

“Maybe you’re just being a little bitch.”

“That should be my stripper name.”

“ _Tony_.”

“The week after next, geez,” Tony groans, shifting himself into an upright position. “I invited him to my birthday dinner. Better get working on that attitude of yours.”

“Isn’t that convenient,” the other man mutters. “Has he met anyone yet?”

“Nope.”

“So you’re just gonna dump him in a room full of strangers and wish him well?”

“Yep,” Tony nods, cowering under the heat of Rhodey’s disapproving stare.

“Does he even _know_ he’s invited?”

“He does now,” Tony grumbles, pulling out his phone from his pocket and firing off a text to Peter. He’d added an _xo_ at the end even. Gosh, he’s become such a romantic again.

“You’re a fucking mess, Tony.”

“I know,” he sighs, taking a drag. “Everyone’s a critic.”

\-----

It’s not that Tony doesn’t want Peter to meet his friends. 

If anything, he wants to fast forward to the part where everyone is chummy with in-jokes and hanging out with each other unprompted by Tony. He wants Peter to be a part of his life and wants to be a part of Peters too. 

It’s just...

There’s so much that Peter doesn’t know. He met Tony at a time of his life when he was on an upward stroke, at the crest of the creaking roller coaster, teetering on the rise or decline. But that’s not all of Tony. To be fair, Peter knows most of the important stuff. Knows that Tony is divorced, has had one major relationship, was a big ol’ slut for a whole five minutes, is an architect by day and sometimes a stripper by night. 

Peter knows that Tony’s favourite movies are The Exorcist and The Fifth Element, that he likes to be the little spoon and that his favourite food is his mother's lasagna. He knows all this little stuff about Tony, all the small parts of his sum. 

But Peter doesn’t know what Tony went through before his divorce. He doesn’t know that some days Tony can’t get out of bed, doesn’t know that to this day sometimes Tony can’t breathe when he hears loud noises or goes outside, can’t be in the dark without a source of light. 

How do you tell someone about the worst thing that happened to you?

How is he supposed to tell Peter that once after the _incident_ his wife put her hands over his eyes to surprise him and Tony panicked and elbowed her, bruising her sternum for two weeks?

It’s only a matter of time before Tony fucks this up, really. It’s with this profoundly uninspiring thought that he goes to this next meeting, Rhodey at his side, Bucky in the front row, Sam moderating to the side. 

Tony can’t tell if his hands are shaking from the adrenaline of just thinking of standing up and talking, or if it’s the feeling of the walls closing in on him, the soft click of the door as it closes, the chatter that sounds like a white noise screech or if it’s because he really needs a cigarette.

“I need a cigarette,” he mumbles to Rhodey, mindful of the person already speaking. 

It’s the only thing he says the entire meeting.

Rhodey says it’s good enough. Tony’s not so sure. Scratch that. It’s undeniably another marked failure in a ever-soaring tally of interpersonal disappointments. 

But Tony valiantly tries not to let it deter him. Instead of despairing - much - he asks himself daily when it might be appropriate to share this kind of information. Is it like a 30th date kind of thing? Not that that’s a relevant measure because Tony has lost count of their ‘dates’. 

Maybe it will all just go away if he doesn’t think about it. Like a pink elephant kind of thing. Although, to be fair he tried that method with his last relationship - well, look how that ended up. 

So he does what he does best and multi-tasks, pairing procrastination with rumination, draws up plans for his clients and tries to figure out how to stop his flowers from dying. They’re looking a little better, he thinks, if you tilt your head to the side and squint.

“Manure,” Bucky offers over brunch the next Saturday after the gym. “Gotta get some good shit, y’know - nutrients so they grow strong. And pesticide. I know a friend who has a farm out in the country - I could pick some up.”

“Sunlight,” Steve says, spooning some oatmeal into his mouth and thumbing at his lovers mouth to wipe off stray hollandaise on his lip, looking ever more in love with each mess the other makes. “Bit of sun exposure, bit of water will do them a world of good. And bees.”

“I don’t want to be a parent,” Tony complains. “Why can’t they grow themselves. This is why I didn’t buy seeds. Aren’t you supposed to like, plant them and spritz them and call it good? Photosynthesis or something?”

“Weren’t you supposed to be nominated for Mensa or some shit,” Bucky asks, mouthful of hash brown, stealing some of Steve's sparkling water after his iced tea is drained. 

“Do I _look_ like a genius to you?”

“They say geniuses are just a different kind of crazy, so yeah.”

“You guys settle on a venue yet?” Tony asks, wiping his mouth with a napkin and flipping Bucky off.

“We were thinking this cozy little place near the coast,” Bucks says, washing down his eggs with OJ. “Could do the ceremony and the after-party at the same place.”

“It’s called a reception you goober,” Steve knocks their shoulders together.

“Whatever.”

“Sounds nice,” Tony says. There’s an uneasiness between his shoulder blades but he isn’t sure why.

“We were thinking of heading up there the week after your birthday to check it out,” Steve indicates with a finger to their waiter for the check. “You should come.”

There it is. Tony pulls out his wallet and throws a couple of twenties onto the table to cover everyones fair and tips. 

“Why?” he asks, snorting self-deprecatingly. “Because I’m one of your only friends with any wedding experience? Don’t tell Yelp but, I think it’s safe to say that my opinion probably isn’t exactly worth too much.”

“Because we trust you actually,” Bucky kicks him from under the table, frowning. “But go off, I guess.”

Tony has the good sense to look chastened. 

\-----

It took Tony longer than it should have to discover the Do Not Disturb function on his phone. It wasn’t until Natasha mentioned it in passing that she was ignoring his texts that he even knew the option was there at all. 

Sunday rolls around like a bone-rattling thundercloud.

The noise enters his house and cracks all of the windows, unceremoniously cutting off the power in his chest, until Tony has no choice but to board his body up and curl up in bed, counting shadows on the walls for something to do.

Tony doesn’t go to the next meeting. When he fails to show up Rhodey calls twice. Natasha sends him a frowning emoji. 

He blames the weird ache in his chest that has been growing steadily for days. It’s like a maelstrom, seeping concrete into his bones, stirring up the worst thoughts in his mind. It feels fatal, like the world as he knows it is ending and there is nothing he can do about it.

When he cancels his date with Peter half an hour before he was due to show up, Tony is thankful for that dumb crescent moon symbol and the fact that Peter only calls once and gets the hint. That way Tony doesn’t have to see the barrage of texts, doesn’t have to have solid evidence of what a monumental disappointment he is. He knows, alright?

Rhodey’s second call comes through but Tony watches his phone dwindle at eight percent despite the charger being _just there_ and lets it go to voicemail. It isn’t until Tony is solidly drunk at three in the afternoon on a Sunday, two-thirds of the way into a bottle of scotch, that he bothers to look through his phone.

_Platypussy: > 10:12am: Hey man, hope everythings okay _

The next few are from Peter. 

_Don’t Call First: > 12:48pm: Sorry you’re not feeling good, everything okay? _

_ > 1:15pm: Hope you’re sleeping. Let me know if you need anything. _

_ > 2:47pm: Miss you, text me when you’re awake. _

He should have really changed the name of Peters contact by now. Isn’t that what a sure thing would do? If it was worth so much, shouldn’t Tony feel worse about blowing him off than he does relieved?

Instead he idly considers getting Uber Eats deliver him something greasy to mitigate the hangover he’s going to be paying his dues for. Except when he looks at the front door and imagines having to open it, to face the outside for even five seconds, to converse with someone for longer than it would take to blink, someone he can’t trust his chest caves in - he can’t _breathe_ \- Tony changes his mind. 

He’s got some canned soup and baked beans. It’ll do.

Shouldn’t he feel bad for blowing off everybody, Tony wonders, vision swimming at the ceiling. How stupid is he for thinking that the rock bottom he’d tripped into wasn’t already swallowing the soil.

He drinks the rest of the bottle instead and doesn’t text back.

\-----

Natasha calls. Peter texts. Rhodey knocks but leaves a grocery bag at his door when there is no answer.

Tony doesn’t charge his phone or leave his house for three days.

\-----

There’s a fierce knocking at his front door the morning of the fourth day.

All the curtains have been closed since Sunday so Tony doesn’t know who it is banging away and he doesn’t care to answer. It must be the neighbours or the mailman or some other noisy asshole that Tony can’t gather enough botheredness to get off of the couch for. Curled upon the sofa, Tony sticks his nose in the heirloom afghan from his grandmother that covers him and breathes in the familiar scent.

“No ones home,” he yells to the door, burying his face into the cushion behind his head.

Except the knocking doesn’t stop. Tony turns up the TV to it’s full volume, hoping the perky antibacterial spray commercials would drown out the noise but it continues to beat like the The Tell-Tale Heart through each patch of silence on the screen.

After ten minutes of intermittent knocking the irritation overrides the listlessness. Tony stomps over to the front door, flinging it open with a furious scowl, ready to give whoever can’t take a hint a piece of his mind.

The same scowl abruptly drops on his face when he notices it’s Peter on the other side of the door, plastic tupperware clutched to his chest and a startled expression on his face.

“Uh, hi,” Peter breathes, blinking, eyes raking over Tony’s disheveled state.

Tony blinks sedately, clutching his shaking hands to the door-frame. There are words - or maybe half words, aborted sentences, snippets of things he wants to say. _Things like I’m sick with -, I’m sorry for - , what do you want from me?_ it all stalls behind the lump in his throat, a traffic jam of truth he can’t give voice to.

“Peter,” Tony says, scrubbing his eyes at the sunlight. “What are you doing here?

“There were protests on campus, I - there was a thing and uh, class was cancelled so I —” Peter cuts off, shoving the plastic container towards Tony. “Thought you were still sick, so…”

The plastic is still warm when Tony grasps it. 

“Oh. Thanks.”

“...You’re welcome,”

Tony stares at the way Peter fidgets with the edge of his sleeve, the strings of frayed fabric at the ends where he has bitten it. He looks suddenly very small against it all, maroon sweater that drowns him in fabric, the large wooden wind chimes loud and obtrusive, and the grey of his porch against Peter's restless feet.

“You should go,” he says, desperate to save him from the trouble. “You might…”

Catch the same emptiness, he thinks, feeling cold all over. As if the blackness in his chest were a viral something. As if Peter might become a zombie by mere proximity. Who knows, maybe he could. Isn’t that why everyone in his life before abandoned him? 

His father always said Tony had a false sense of grandeur - he can’t tell what side of that statement this belief lives on.

Tony swallows. The shakes go and Tony is so still, so perfectly still.

“Are you…” Peter begins. “You okay, Tony?”

“Yeah,” Tony scrubs his beard. “You should go.”

Peter frowns, quiet as his eyes scan Tony and the piles of rubbish huddled around the doorway as if they can’t wait for collection day, the darkness inside the house making it seem like a bleak cavern - or a mausoleum. 

A canon booms behind his chest.

“You know what, I don’t care,” Tony replies, turning around and leaving the door open, shuffling back inside and settling the container somewhere, vaguely paying attention to the echo of Peters footsteps and the door closing behind him.

Curling into the corner of the sofa, Tony tries to focus on the TV, on anything except the chasm Tony has created when Peter settles tentatively on the opposite end of the sofa, hands clasped in his lap as his knees knock deliberatively. Shame prickles over Tony’s entire body as he becomes aware of the empty bottles of liquor laid all over the coffee table and kitchen bench, at the left out food, discarded cigarette butts, the musky, acidic stench of body odour and alcohol. He can feel the burn of Peter’s stare on all of it, can hear the cogs working inside of his brain. 

Tony hasn’t showered in days.

“Do you want a drink?” Tony offers. “I have...water.”

“Oh, uh… no, thank you, I’m good...” Peter declines.

“Okay.”

“...I made you um, some chicken soup,” he refers to the container, wherever it was left.

“Thank you,” Tony says, lighting a cigarette. There’s only six left before he will have to leave the house to get another packet. Goddamn, is there an Uber Eats for this kind of thing?

“Tony…” Peter begins. “Are you okay?”

He laughs around the filter, a brittle, croaky thing. “Yeah, baby. Don’t I look okay?”

“You look like shit, to be honest.”

“Well, you don’t gotta stick around and stare if you don’t want to.”

“Do you want me to go because you don’t want me here,” Peter shifts to face Tony, holding his hands in his lap, “ - or because you don’t want me to see you like this?”

Tony has to swallow down the first few unkind responses, the ones that are already barbed in his throat, laced with enough thorns designed to make sure no-one wants to touch him. But even some part of him must have some basic level of self preservation because he swallows anything of value to say at all.

“I’m sorry,” Tony says instead, offering Peter the last of his cigarette as apology for all of the terrible things he wants to say. “I’m just not very good company right now.”

“It’s okay,” Peter takes the offered cigarette, looking at it as it burns down, taking a slow drag after a few moments. “I get it.”

A low burning ire stokes in his lower back, he wants to say, how could you possibly get it, how do you think it feels to look at everything you’ve built and want to tear it all down just to feel something? But what does Tony know of Peter, really? 

“There’s a lot of shit you don’t know,” Tony says, rubbing his eyes. “I don’t know if I’m worth the trouble to be honest.”

In his mind’s eye he sees Peter agreeing to that statement, maybe starting an argument as he gestures to the nest of crap that Tony’s surrounded himself in as evidence as his inability to be a good partner. Tony imagines Peter’s voice turning into his ex-wife’s, asking when is he going to grow up and act like an adult, when is he going to stop feeling sorry for himself and snap out of it? _How hard can it be, Tony?_

“You _are_ worth it,” Peter nods, a small, sad smile on his face. “You’re just having a bad time, that doesn’t make you unworthy.”

“Agree to disagree,” Tony mumbles, picking at the hole in his shirt to avoid meeting his lovers eyes.

“Okay,” Peter doesn’t argue. “Can I stay though?”

Tony snorts, doing the job himself and gesturing to the pile of half-chewed pizza slices that have been on his coffee table for two days. “You can’t possibly want to be here.”

“Sure I do,” Peter insists. “Do you think I only want to be around you when you’re okay?”

“Don’t you?”

He doesn’t mean to say it. Well, he does, but in his head he’s always phrased it delicately and at a time when Tony felt brave enough to be honest and transparent about his issues, not neck-deep in the thick of it. 

Who cares.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Peter bites his pinky nail, gaze guarded.

Shaking his head, he tries again. “Sorry, rephrase. Do you really want to be here when I’m being a piece of shit?”

“Yes,” Peter says, vehement. “And you know what, sorry, _rephrase_. I want to be here, I’m staying here with you.” 

“Don’t be stupid.”

“Stupid,” Peter repeats. “How about don’t be an asshole, Tony? I’m staying and I’m going to heat up this soup while you have a shower.”

“I don’t _want_ to have a shower.”

“I’m not asking if you want to,” Peter responds, “I’m asking if you can manage it.”

“I don’t --” Chest hot, Tony raises his voice before he cuts himself off, overcome with shame. 

Peter is quiet and Tony can feel his eyes burning on him as he is being quietly assessed. It makes Tony want to disintegrate into the sofa until Peter sighs softly, scoots over and squeezes Tony’s shoulder. It should be a small miracle that he doesn’t retch at the vile stench of booze and days old sweat permeating from Tony’s skin.

“I know, but it will make you feel a little better. Just a little.”

The darkness festering in his chest spreads, crawling up his throat. “I’m not an invalid,” Tony snaps and immediately regretting it. He raises his hands to cover his face. “Fuck. Sorry.”

“I know you’re not an invalid,” Peter says patiently. “But you’re in pain. Let me help.”

The distance between the sofa and the shower seems shifting his heavy body insurmountable. “I’m sorry,” Tony stares at the coffee table. Still miraculously at his side, Peter squeezes his shoulder. 

“S’okay, I got you. You don’t have to explain. C’mon, I’ll get your towels and clothes, you can just turn on the water. That okay?”

Tony deliberates, then nods.

“Awesome,” Peter says, taking his hand and squeezing it tightly. 

\-----

“When I was fourteen I was a little asshole,” Peter whispers later that night, curled up behind Tony on the couch, both of their stomachs full of soup and dry toast, the heater beating pleasantly in the corner.

“Hmm?” Tony hums, shifting back against Peter’s chest.

“I was… I don’t know, I thought I was top shit,” Peter continues, kissing Tony’s shoulder and stroking his stomach. “Thought I was invincible and acted out a lot. Drove my aunt and uncle crazy.”

Tony makes an inquisitive noise, staring at the screen as it fills the room with noise and technicolour glow. They’re watching the The Fifth Element.

“I skipped curfew one night to hang with some new friends,” Peter’s Adam's apple bobs against his neck. “They were bad news and I knew it, I just didn’t care, y’know. My Uncle Ben told me I should think about who I hang out with. I was a real jerk about it to him.”

The fingers stroking his stomach still.

“That night I skipped curfew Ben came to pick me up. All my supposed _friends_ had left to go get fucked up - he drove all the way downtown to pick my stupid ass up at three in the morning when he had to work the next day. He was that kinda guy, y’know?”

Tony closes his eyes as Plavalaguna sings her ethereal song, not needing to see to know how the story goes. He covers Peter’s hand with his own.

“Anyway there was this girl. He tried to stop two men from mugging her. He got shot twice,” Peter says, tone flat. Bang, bang. 

“Pete…”

“I was there. I held him and tried to stop the bleeding but he died before the ambulance got there. The last thing he said was ‘Tell May.’”

“‘Tell May’ what?” Tony asks, swallowing around the lump in his throat.

“I don’t know,” Peter says.

Tony turns around, faces Peter properly for the first time. “I’m so fucking sorry,” he says, burying his hand into Peters hair, stroking his scalp. The younger man's eyes are wet and his lips are in a thin line.

“I’m not telling you this to make you feel bad,” Peter whispers, rocking them together, winding his arms around the older man's waist. “But because I trust you to know I’m not okay sometimes too. I’m really not, Tony.”

Tony kisses him, eyelashes damp. 

On the screen Leeloo lays gravely wounded in the air vents, sobbing wretchedly to no one.

“You were just a kid,” he says. 

“Doesn’t matter when it happened,” Peter murmurs. “It happened. When are you supposed to be prepared for it?”

Tony doesn’t have an answer for that.

\-----

Peter encourages Tony to go outside to his letterbox the following morning.

It doesn’t go well.

“How can you stand this?” Tony asks, face buried in his hands, sitting down in the shower. Searing hot water beats over his body as he tries to stop the violent trembling, the maelstrom shaking him apart. “I’m not your _project_ , if that’s what you think this is.”

“You’re not my project, Tony,” Peter sighed, sitting on the tiles outside the shower. “I can stand this because I want to. You’d do the same for me.”

Tony doesn’t answer. He presses his face harder into his fingers hoping they stifle the sobs that unleash from his chest.

\-----

He does better the next day.

Only just.

\-----

Peter takes the week off classes and his job to take care of Tony. He says his professors are okay with it, that everything can be emailed and that his boss owes him some holidays anyway. It doesn’t make Tony feel very good, despite all of the younger mans reassurances.

 _Beast of burden_ , Tony thinks, watching as Peter washes his day old dishes and helps him put on a load of laundry. 

There’s a short argument about it. Tony, embarrassed by his own uselessness, accuses Peter of coddling him. Peter bites back, saying he’d rather coddle Tony and have him resent him for it then find him choked on his own vomit.

Tony can’t really argue that so he lets it drop, mostly, and lets Peter take care of it. He blows off work, cancels his meetings and catch-ups, ghosts his friends and cancels a gig at a seniors that he was previously looking forward to.

“No one likes a limp dick,” Tony explains on the third day of Peters’ stay, burying his hands in soil of the front yard garden bed. 

As beaten down as Tony still feels, Peter looks like a dream wearing a backwards baseball cap, slumped next to Tony as he picks weeds out from under the lavender bush, depositing them in a small pile to the side.

Peter hums, offering him a wicked grin, eyelids crinkling at the sides at whatever powers from his own thoughts. “I hardly think you’d be the only person with a limp dick at a seniors party.”

“That is true,” Tony concedes.

“Besides, it’s probably for the best.”

“Why,” Tony queries quaintly, planting seeds in the furrowed ground, covering them back up with soil. “You jealous of some wrinkly old hands touching my junk?”

Peter snorts. “I was just thinking that even with a limp dick you’d still be hot enough to give one of those old farts a heart attack. Someone’s gonna leave on a stretcher.”

“Yeah, but do you think this routine would be worth cardiac arrest,” Tony asks, raising his soiled hands up and shimmying his hips listlessly. His body barely responds to the thought of sexy, hips swaying like a senior straight off their walker.

“Like what?” Peter prompts, snickering. “How’s it go again?”

Tony raises his arms and does it again, thinks _doink doink_. He huffs amusedly, despite himself.

Peter snorts into his gardening gloves, eyes full of mirth. “Do it again,” he says.

Tony does, lips lifting at the sound of Peter’s choked guffaws.

“Fuck,” Peter sighs, thumping his chest to catch his breath as he lays back on the freshly mown grass. “Oh my god, Tony, that was the best. That’s so funny, you're such a dork.”

Upon his cloud of clipped grass Peter raises his hands and does the same apathetic motions, rocking his lips lazily from side to side, his laughter renewed by the motion.

Tony can’t help himself. He snickers loudly, crawling into the circle that Peter creates with his outstretched arms, resting his head on Peter’s still shaking shoulder. Once the laughter subsides and the sounds of the suburban outdoors reigns, contemplation takes over for the first time in days. 

The fall wind feels nice when it ruffles through his hair, where it animates the branches of the overhead bur oak, the sun peeking through the dancing leaves. It’s nice when it carries over the scent of soil and Peter’s sweat, everything suddenly seeming like a quiet, bucolic oil painting.

“What would you want to plant if you had your own yard?” Tony queries, closing his eyes to enjoy the sensation of Peter gently stroking his bare shoulder.

The man is quiet for a while before he answers, lips smacking. “Hmmm...a fig tree, I think.”

“A fig tree?”

“Yeah.”

“Why a fig tree?” Tony queries, feeling himself drift off. “S’it the wrinkly ballsack appearance?”

“Nah,” Peter says, raking his nails down Tony’s arm. “It’d just be nice, y’know. You could plant it right outside your kitchen window and in the summer we could could make fig jam. Maybe sell it at the farmers' market.”

“I do like fig jam,” Tony agrees. 

“I know you do.”

He doesn’t say how much he likes the sound of Peter’s vision of their future or how a small part of him settles when the images play unbidden in faded technicolour. Without asking to proceed, his heart latches onto the syrupy visions of weekends together working in the garden, standing side-by-side at a market stall on Sundays.

“Tomorrow,” Tony says. “We should go pick one up at the nursery and plant it. If you want.”

Peter kisses his hairline. “I really want.”

They do.

\-----

“You’re a mess,” Natasha says four days after Peter leaves. “Has anyone ever told you that?”

When Tony felt ready to leave the house they went back to the thrift store. Peter went home with an ushanka that he wore on his head the whole day and Tony came home with penis-shaped cutlery. 

“I know,” Tony says, shoving coleslaw into his mouth, gripping the metal testicles. “But I’m getting better.”

“You are,” she concurs, spearing her own salad with a phallus-fork. “You’re also two weeks behind on work, which, y’know, you’re lucky you have me, but I still love you. It’s that dumb face of yours, it’s oddly charming.”

“I’m touched,” Tony drawls. “Tickled even.”

“I don’t care,” she says.

They eat in silence, getting the preliminary blueprints messy with strays streaks of mayonnaise and rings of condensation collected at the bottom of their beer bottles. 

The day after they picked up and planted the fig tree they went straight to their favourite thrift store - and how strange it was to be in the unexpected place in his life where he and his partner had _a favourite thrift store._

“I like your new painting,” she says later, nodding to Sir Henry. “It’s very you.”

“Isn’t it?” Tony grins.

“Yeah, but I don’t like you smiling like that though, it’s weird.”

“I’m _happy_ you nasty wench.”

“Are you?”

“Yeah,” Tony shrugs. “Y’know, almost.”

She knocks their bottles together in cheers. Tony’s almost tips over, but rights itself. “Where’d you get it?” She asks, referring to the painting again. “Auction?”

In another life, Tony thinks, smiling when he looks at it. He just looks so proud to be a frilly pup. “Nah, thrift store,” he says. “Eight bucks. Peter noticed it.”

“Nice,” she nods, eyes raking over it appreciatively. “So am I ever gonna meet this guy or is he like a girlfriend from Canada kind of thing?”

Tony fixes her a stare, throwing an empty carton of cigarettes at her. “You will on Saturday - and shut the fuck up, you follow his Instagram.”

“It’s reconnaissance,” Natasha rebukes, throwing the packet back after it hits her in the chest. “Makin’ sure he isn’t up to no good.”

At once Tony feels both irritated and fond, the overprotective gesture both a balm and a burr he wants to instinctively scratch off. Before he speaks he watches the way Natasha bites her lip, how her eyes drift like a sinking leaf around the room.

“What do you think?” He asks softly.

“He’s cute,” she tilts her head. “A bit jailbaity.”

“So then on Saturday I expect you’ll be on your best behaviour, yes?”

“Best behaviour,” she scoffs, picking her teeth with her fingernail, looking at Tony as she does it. The gesture is vaguely threatening and he's not sure why. “Why? You really like this guy, huh?”

“You answering a question with a question?”

Natasha throws back the rest of her beer. “Yes.”

Tony looks at his hands and thinks of the way that Peter strokes Tony’s eyebrows, his nose, his lips when he thinks that Tony is sleeping. “Yeah, I really do. To be frank, say what you want. I don’t even care if you think it’s stupid.”

“He’s just young. Doesn’t mean it’s stupid.”

“You’d be the first to say so,” Tony huffs, throwing back his own beer.

“I’m a pioneer that way. Tell me about him.”

“He’s gorgeous and kind. Super smart, like holy shit,” Tony scratches his beard to hide his smile.

“Yeah?”

“Like an actual certified genius, and not in that weird so smart he’s socially hindered kinda way. I called him Einstein once and he asked me not to, so I guess he’s like, shy about it or something. That’s cute right? Humble?”

“Yeah,” she smiles.

“And he’s so fucking kind and _wise_. He’s just, y’know - beautiful.”

“I’m going to befriend him,” Natasha decides, swinging her legs up to rest on the dining table. In a feat of balance and flexibility she reaches back to her handbag on the ground to retrieve a metal flask and sips from it.

Tony rests back on his dining chair, eyeing her as she swills what smells like vodka around in her mouth. “You’re going to what now?”

“Befriend him,” she nods. 

“That’s...nice. I think? If it were anyone but you, I mean.”

“Sure is. That way if he double-crosses you he’ll either confide in me, or won’t see me coming.”

Tony snorts. “What if he turns you against my crazy ass and becomes your new best friend?”

Natasha sends him a bewildered look. “Unless he’s the type of guy to take a building design and says _lets make it look like a corndog_? Impossible. You’re not that replaceable.”

“I am ineffable,” Tony agrees. “You’re lucky to have me as a business partner.”

“Now you’re getting it.”

\-----

The day before his birthday Tony buys a porch swing. 

There’s a yard sale the street over. An elderly couple are selling up and getting rid of everything they don’t need anymore. They’re going to travel across America, they tell Tony when he stops by to browse. The swing needs work, but not much. A new coat of varnish, a new set of cushions, some bits and pieces here and there.

It’s a steal at twenty bucks. But Tony’s only thinking about eating fig jam toast in the mornings, curled up next to a sleepy Peter, rocking on the swing as they watch the neighbourhood wake on sleepy mornings, waving at their neighbours, tasting coffee off of Peter’s lips. 

He gives them fifty for it.

\-----

“They’re going to hate me,” Peter frets, pausing in his dish drying send Tony a beseeching stare. 

“They’re not going to hate you, honey,” Tony assures, taking his hand out of the suds to brush his knuckles against the younger man's cheek, wiping away the soapy residue with his thumb

“Yes, they are. They’re going to take on look at me and say _who the fuck is this_?”

“Peter, Peter,” Tony shakes his head. “If anyone has ever looked at you and hated you they need to have their head checked, and this is coming from a certified crazy person. It's the truth. Accept it.”

“ _Tony_.”

“Shh, come on, I promise. Now these guys may not exercise the best of judgement on a good day - they are friends with me, after all - but they couldn’t possibly hate you.”

Peter sighs, resuming his drying. “That doesn’t make me feel better.”

“You’ll be fine,” Tony tries to reassure him, bumping their hips together. “And if they do hate you we’ll just kick them out and eat all their food. I hear Pepper is bringing chocolate cake. We can screw on the table afterwards.”

Tony flicks water at Peter while Roxette plays on repeat in the background. The younger man squawks, whipping Tony in the ass with his hand towel in retaliation. 

“You’re such a romantic,” Peter rolls his eyes, but his smile is fond anyway.

\-----

Tony’s friends don’t like Peter.

They don’t like Peter at all.

They _love_ him.

The whole crew comes, which is quietly rather heartwarming, even if Tony will never, upon pain of death, say that out loud. Even Pepper comes, a diplomatic move that no doubt will run the gossip mill of his former company.

Everyone arrives more or less on time, introductions are traded and more than once does the word jailbait get thrown about. It’s thrown in with a healthy mix of cradle robber and on one occasion does Bucky call Peter Anna Nicole Smith.

Being the man that he is, Peter takes it on the nose, smiling at the jabs and taking it all in stride, even if Tony does send some warning glares over the top of his head. That’s what snaps Peter out of his initial placid politeness, stilling comically mid-drink when Sam jokingly calls him _Lolita_.

“Okay, okay,” Peter nods, placing his cards face down on the table. “I get it, I’m young. You’re not. I get carded, you don’t. Maybe your eyesight is going out? I don’t know, but I’m gonna give you this one chance never to call me that again.”

Rhodey snorts, hiding his laughter behind his deck as Sam grins.

“Tony, I _love_ him,” Natasha pouts. She turns to Peter, clutching her heart. “Peter, I love you. You can come to every poker night.”

“Uh, thanks, I think?

“So, Peter,” Pepper cuts in. “What do you do?”

“Oh, I’m a grad student. Biochem. Oh, and I work at the Starbucks on Fifth.”

The woman smiles politely, pushing a stack of chips forward. “Sounds challenging.”

Peter shrugs, sipping from his beer. “Yeah, it’s a lot, but I like it.”

“He’s brilliant,” Tony cuts in, patting Peter’s thigh under the table. “Smarter than all you dumbasses put together.”

“No, I’m really not,” Peter rushes to assure. “I wore my shirt backwards all morning.”

“And how did you and Tony meet?” Bucky asks, leaning forward, eyeing them both curiously.

Peter chokes on his drink.

“I gave him a lapdance for his birthday,” Tony says, squeezing Peter’s thigh. He winks to the room. “And then some.”

“I’m just kidding,” Bucky waves off to a deeply flushed Peter. “I already knew.”

“Buck here used to be a stripper,” Tony explains. “Not as good as me, of course, I mean who is --”

“That’s debatable,” Steve throws an arm over his partner's shoulder.

“Tell that to my accountant.”

Steve snorts. “You don’t _have_ an accountant.”

“Wait, you don’t have an accountant?” Natasha asks, slamming her cards on the table and looking appropriately bewildered.

“I don’t have a _personal_ accountant,” Tony clarifies, “I can do my own taxes. I’m multi-skilled.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Anyhow,” Tony continues, ignoring the heat of Nat's stare on the side of his face. “Bucky got me in the business when I needed a hand.”

Tony feels the moment Peter softens, looking between the two men. 

“So,” Peter swallows, placing his hand over Tony’s where it rests on his thigh, “I guess I have you to thank for meeting this guy?”

Bucky blinks, a grin taking over his face. He gestures between Tony and Peter and nods. “Yes. I take full credit for this.”

“A romance for the ages,” Rhodey says dryly. “Now are we playing Poker or do you guys need a moment?”

\-----

Pepper volunteers to help bring in all of the dishes to the kitchen. Wordlessly, she helps scrape all the scraps and re-lids the dips. She’s only ever been at Tony’s new place twice before but she remembers where everything is without prompting. Everything smells like detergent and the afterburn of birthday candles and Tony's strangely content and satisfied, boneless like after a good workout.

“Thanks,” Tony accepts the glassware and cutlery from her, stacking them in the sink and offering her a tired smile. Outside his kitchen window the neighbours back-porch lights illuminate a fledgling fig tree in Tony's backyard. The sight makes his smile strengthen, his stomach doing weird things.

“I told her I would be coming,” Pepper says softly from behind him. “She wants to know how you are.”

Tony stiffens at the mention, watching the water run over the used plates as his smile drops from up high. “Huh,” he says, adjusting the taps and adding detergent to the filling sink. 

“She’s doing --”

Tony turns quickly, putting a halting hand up. “I’m going to stop you there, Pep. Very sorry, but I don’t care how she’s doing. Don't care, don’t want to know. She’s not a part of my life.”

“You were married for twenty years,Tony,” she blinks, gaze turning inquisitive. “You’re not even curious?”

“No,” Tony says. He’s tried being curious. He’s tried searching around his chest for that last fraying attachment, that tendril of heart string that still played for her. “That part of my life is done. You can tell her I’m doing great. That I’m happy and that I moved on.”

“I’ll let her know,” Pepper nods, smiling in that way that she does. It’s the one that makes her and Rhodey such a good team, everything locked and loaded behind those lips, carefully deployed if needed.

“Thanks, Pep.”

Tony thinks that’s done, when she steps back eyes roaming across the kitchen and the adjacent living room, taking stock all of the things that are different.

“Peter seems nice. Young, but I can see how he’d be good for you.”

“He’s incredible,” Tony agrees, leaning back against the bench and crossing his arms over his chest. “You know, it’s ridiculous. Even after what happened, he makes me want to do it all over again. It’s stupid, right? Don’t answer - it’s stupid, I know.”

Pepper smiles, linking her arm with Rhodeys when he comes to collect her, kissing her cheek. “It’s not stupid,” Pepper kisses her husbands temple. “I’ll see you later?”

“Drive safe,” Tony nods, lifting a hand in farewell as the couple turn to leave.

“See you next week, dumbass,” Rhodey calls back, slipping an arm around Peppers waist and heading for the front door.

“You complete me, honeybear,” Tony shouts back just in time for Peter to slink into the kitchen, hands on his hips and an impish smile on his face.

“Should I be jealous?” He asks, shuffling closer and winding his arms around Tony’s waist, muscles easing. He smells like sweat and alcohol and lemon soap when he leans in, to peck Tony's cheek. “Tell me, am I just second best? A stand in for the guy you wanted all along?”

“You’re _the_ best,” Tony cups Peter’s cheeks, leaning in to kiss him sweetly. “My number one guy.”

“That’s better,” Peter nods, kissing him again.

“I told you they’d like you,” Tony says a little smugly. “I was right. You were wrong.”

“You had an unfair advantage on account of knowing them,” Peter counters, slipping his hands down to knead at Tony’s ass over his jeans. “That doesn’t count.”

“Semantics. Shame we didn’t have an excuse to kick them out and fuck on the table.”

“Do we need an excuse for that?”

“It seems highly unsanitary."

“So, right up your alley then.”

Tony shrugs. “I like mess, what can I say.”

\-----

Britney Spears' _Stronger_ plays on Tony's phone through the speakers on their way downtown and Peter doesn’t laugh or skip a beat, just belts the lyrics out as they play.

“My loneliness ain't killin’ me no more,” Peter wails, raising his hands above his head, nodding his head to the lyrics. 

“Hands on the wheel,” Tony says, laughing as Peter misquotes the lyrics on the next verse, mumbling some made up lines to himself and generally sounding like a tone-deaf cat. God, this man cannot sing but damn if he doesn't look good trying. 

“This playlist is dope,” Peter shouts to be heard over the music, bass turned up so much through Peter’s speakers that Tony can feel it down to his bones. It centres him, feeling the music through his body. He’s gonna need it.

He knows this curve of road, his gut turns in the anticipation.

It’s nice, Tony thinks, despite the anxiety clawing his stomach to shreds. Peter and him driving, windows down, music turned up loud. Even feeling like death is in a drag race with them, he feels like he could do this forever.

\-----

Tony’s mouth is bone-dry. When he swallows to wet his throat, it’s as if there’s a thick, glue-like residue that coats over his larynx, his tongue feels too big to swallow around.

Fat beads of sweat dot his upper lip. They taste salty when Tony licks them, damp when he runs his hand down his face. Blinking, Tony peers out over the small crowd of seated people who peer up at him, waiting for him to speak. Peter’s sat there in the back and when Tony catches his eye, the younger man nods and smiles at him.

Hands trembling, Tony nods back.

He speaks.


End file.
